Rich Franklin finally decides what's next for his career 6 months after the devistating KO loss to Cung Le. He's not planning on retiring just yet, and he plan on fighting Michael Bisping next.
Rich Franklin talked to Ariel Helwani on last week's episode of The MMA Hour and he says he has no plans to retire just yet, dispite his KO loss to Cung Le last November at UFC: Macao:
I haven't been sitting on my end thinking about retirement. I don't want any of the fans out there to think: Oh, Rich is just out there contemplating retiring.
The loss to Cung was a big setback for me. Unexpected in my camp, I'm kind of sitting here thinking what's my next move going to be. And I realized I'm 38 years old and my time is limited in the sport. I know that I'm not going to be fighting another 10 years. I have to start think about the things that I'm doing outside of MMA.
The loss to Cung was a big setback for me. Unexpected in my camp, I'm kind of sitting here thinking what's my next move going to be. And I realized I'm 38 years old and my time is limited in the sport. I know that I'm not going to be fighting another 10 years. I have to start think about the things that I'm doing outside of MMA.
His remaining time in the UFC is going to be limited, like he said. And Franklin already knows what's next for him: Michael Bisping. Even though the fight doesn't make, because Franklin just came of a KO loss and Bisping just had a great win over Alan Belcher at UFC 159 but Franklin sees it differently:
I look at my Twitter and a lot of people talk about Michael Bisping. That would be an exciting fight and something the fans would want to see. I’m an exciting fighter, he’s an exciting fighter, and we both like to throw down.
Tito Ortiz won the vacant belt by Unanimous Decision against Wanderlei Silva at UFC 25 on April 14, 2000 at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium in Tokyo, Japan. After he became champ, he succesfully defended his title against Yuki Kondo, Evan Tanner, Elvis Sinosic, Vladimir Matyushenko and Ken Shamrock. He then lost the title against Randy Couture at UFC 44 on September 26, 2003, at the Mandalay Bay Events Center on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada.