Dana White has been fanning the flames of speculation for a while about the identities of the coaches of the next season of The Ultimate Fighter. He purportedly made up his mind on Friday after publicly mulling Brock Lesnar vs Frank Mir and Chael Sonnen vs Wanderlei Silva as possibilities.
The Lesnar/Mir pairing got an instant debunking when word linked that Frank Mir vs Brendan Schaub was signed.
Chael and Wandy was eliminated by White at the UFC press conference in Rio.
Presumably White either gave up on enticing the reclusive Lesnar onto the show or Lesnar turned it down and they thought better of rubbing Sonnen's PED suspenion in the face of NSAC boss Keith Kizer who had publicly blustered about Sonnen's statements at his suspension hearing in California.
That leaves those of us in the edumacated guessing business chewing on the third option White discussed openly: the bantamweights. Initially the report indicated White was considering Faber and former bantamweight champ Miguel Torres. After current champ Dominick Cruz' incredibly dominant title defense over Scott Jorgensen, he has become the focus of talk.
MMA Junkie spoke to Cruz about the show and his old beef with Urijah Faber:
There's been some speculation Cruz and Faber could be cast as opposing coaches in the upcoming 13th season of "The Ultimate Fighter," which begins taping in January.
Cruz has a lingering hand injury he hopes to address shortly, but the 25-year-old said he's be willing to wait on that surgery if it means a chance to coach opposite Faber and fight him at the conclusion of the season.
"I would accept it very much, and I'd be stoked, and it would be awesome because I would get my loss back," Cruz said. "An opportunity like that, I might have to deal with the hand again.
On the other side of the ledger, Fighters Only reported that Miguel Torres had been approached about coaching the show:
There has been some contact with Miguel Torres regarding him taking a coaching spot on The Ultimate Fighter 13.
Sources close to the situation confirmed to Fighters Only on Friday that Torres' name has been in the mix and that he has been spoken to about the possibility, although nothing was confirmed during the talks.
Fightlinker seems to like the Torres and Faber combination:
While Faber vs Torres would tie up two of the division's hottest stars, it at least leaves the belt free so the first bantamweight title fight can happen before Fall 2011. Plus, Faber vs Torres is one of those dream fights from last year that's starting to get near it's past-due date. If they're going to do it, now ain't a bad time.