UFC
Lorenzo Fertitta guarantees CM Punk's first UFC opponent will be a "competitive guy"
Jan 28, 2015 - 3:30:45 PM Lorenzo Fertitta guarantees CM Punk's first UFC opponent will be a "competitive guy"

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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

"I think it has to be somebody with some level of credentials. It's not just going to be some guy off the street. It's going to be somebody who is a professional mixed martial artist - certainly somebody who MMA media will recognize and know. [We'll most likely go outside of the organization to find someone]. But I'm going to defer to Joe Silva. We'll let him bring two to three names to the table and we'll figure it out from there. But I guarantee you it will be a competitive guy...

We knew there was going to be backlash. At the end of the day, we did our research and we talked to the people he's trained with. We're going to find out what he can bring to the table. We're confident he has the skills to fight. We don't know exactly what level yet. Sometimes, you've got to invest in what we call 'fighter development.' We've done it before and guys have developed into very competitive fighters, and we've done it where guys have not."

-UFC owner Lorenzo Fertitta talks to ESPN.com about signing CM Punk, and what level of fighter he's likely to face in his debut.

Penick's Analysis: I'm not sure what the trade off will have to be, or what names are out there, to both fit into the "someone MMA media will recognize" camp and to be someone without too much experience so that the fight will be sanctioned. That's part of the problem, because no commission is going to send Punk into his first professional fight against someone who has a lot of experience. And if they go outside of the UFC for someone with relatively minor experience, I don't know what types of "recognizable" names would fit that criteria. Regardless, we'll find out in the next several months just what we'll be getting from them on this front.