Jens Pulver May Move to WEC, Featherweight Division
According to MMAFrenzy.com sources it is a likely possibility the UFC veteran and current Ultimate Fighter 5 coach Jens Pulver will move to the Zuffa-owned World Extreme Cagefighting (WEC) organization after his fight against BJ Penn at the TUF 5 Finale later this month.
Just yesterday WEC made its televised debut on Versus featuring a successful featherweight title defense by Urijah Faber.
If the move ultimately happens Pulver will likely drop from the UFC lightweight division (155 lbs.) to the featherweight division in the WEC (145 lbs.). In all likelihood the former UFC champion would receive an immediate title shot against Faber.
Jens won the UFC lightweight title in 2001 defending it succesfully twice incuding against his upcoming competitor BJ Penn in 2002. Pulver left the organization due to contractual problems and the weight class was disbanded until October of last year when Sean Sherk won the vacant title. Pulver returned to the UFC last year losing to Joe Lauzon in his first fight back.
His upcoming fight with Penn is expected to be for a title shot against the UFC 73 winner of Sean Sherk vs. Hermes Franca. If Pulver wins on the finale expect him to stay in the UFC although a loss will likely move him to the WEC where he can anchor a burgeoning new organization and a weight class the UFC has yet to embrace.
Tags: BJ Penn, Jens Pulver
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Ya know, Pulver has been pretty decent on TUF but he just rubs me the wrong way. So in my warped, perfect world he gets thumped by Penn then moves to the WEC where Faber would thump him too.
“According to UFCDaily.com sources…”
By UFCDaily.com sources you mean Monte Cox’s appearance on the Sherdog Radio network where everyone else heard the news…
Dr J,
Actually we started to hear about this over the weekend around the WEC event but they were too much heresay and not enough to really publish the rumor on.
The Sherdog radio show did have the story although there were rumblings of a Pulver loss moving him to WEC before it was on the radio, at least that is what my sources are saying about the situation. That’s why it’s rumors after all.