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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
Despite Chael Sonnen being unable to coach against him on The Ultimate Fighter, Michael Bisping will still take his second stint on the reality show.
UFC President Dana White confirmed on Friday in a statement to The Underground at MMA.TV that Bisping will coach on the 14th iteration of the show against Jason "Mayhem" Miller.
The outspoken and entertaining Miller - host of MTV's "Bully Beatdown" program - returns to the UFC for the first time in five years, and will be pulled from a planned bout with Aaron Simpson at UFC 132 in July, instead meeting Bisping following the conclusion of the show in December.
The 14th season of the show will be the first to feature the bantamweight and featherweight divisions, and begins filming next month in Las Vegas. Bisping previously coached during the ninth season against Dan Henderson in the U.S. vs. U.K. season.
Penick's Analysis: This was an option a lot of people talked about when Miller's signing with the UFC was revealed earlier this year, but I'm surprised the UFC actually decided to pull the trigger with this. For one, he was going to be on the preliminary card of UFC 132, so the UFC initially hadn't planned to really showcase him in that return fight, but he'll now be featured on Spike TV for a full season of TUF and get a high profile fight with Bisping. It's going to mean a really long layoff for him, but he's taking a tradeoff by getting the added exposure in place of fetting into the cage sooner. It could make for a very interesting season of the show, and I'll be among those looking forward to what Miller brings to the show as well as Bisping a second time around.
[Michael Bisping art by Cory Gould (c) MMATorch.com]
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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