McDonald vs. Soto official, UFC 139 lineup again complete with 12 bouts
The lineup for next week's UFC 139 event again is official with 12 bouts.
UFC officials recently confirmed that newcomer Alex Soto (6-0-1 MMA, 0-0 UFC) has replaced injured Johnny Eduardo (25-9 MMA, 0-1 UFC) and now meets bantamweight Michael McDonald (13-1 MMA, 2-0 UFC) at the event.
MMAjunkie.com (
www.mmajunkie.com) passed along news of the bout on Wednesday.
UFC 139 takes place Nov. 19 at HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif.
While the main card, including a light-heavyweight headliner between Dan Henderson and Mauricio "Shogun" Rua, airs on pay-per-view, Eduardo vs. McDonald is slated for the portion of the preliminary card expected to stream on Facebook.
The 20-year-old McDonald, a former Tachi Palace Fights champion, is 3-0 under the Zuffa banner with a WEC victory over Clint Godfrey and UFC wins over Edwin Figueroa (which earned a "Fight of the Night" award) and Chris Cariaso. The Brazilian jiu-jitsu brown belt has now won six straight fights, which included the Tachi title win over Cole Escovedo to avenge his only career defeat.
Soto recently was featured in our "Fight Path" series, in which the former U.S. Army war veteran and U.S. Navy dolphin trainer discussed his thirst for adventure. Although he came up just short of a spot on "The Ultimate Fighter 14," he now makes his UFC debut fresh off a six-fight win streak that recently was halted with a draw against Seiji Akao (15-4-1) at June's DEEP 54 event in Japan.
The official UFC 139 card now includes:
MAIN CARD (Pay-per-view)
Dan Henderson vs. Mauricio "Shogun" Rua
Cung Le vs. Wanderlei Silva
Brian Bowles vs. Urijah Faber
Martin Kampmann vs. Rick Story
Stephan Bonnar vs. Kyle Kingsbury
PRELIMINARY CARD (Spike TV)
Ryan Bader vs. Jason Brilz
Tom Lawlor vs. Chris Weidman
PRELIMINARY CARD
Nick Pace vs. Miguel Torres
Rafael dos Anjos vs. Gleison Tibau
Michael McDonald vs. Alex Soto
Seth Baczynski vs. Matt Brown
Shamar Bailey vs. Danny Castillo
