Sign up for ESPN+ right here, and you can then stream the UFC live on
your smart TV, computer, phone, tablet or streaming device via the
ESPN app. It appears that Francisco
Trinaldo is staying at welterweight for the foreseeable
future. According to MMA
DNA on Thursday, Trinaldo (26-8) will be stepping in for
Gabriel
Green at
UFC Fight Night 196. At welterweight, “Massaranduba” will face
Dwight
Grant (11-3) on the card staged at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas on
Oct. 23. Trinaldo has since confirmed this pairing on Instagram.
Trinaldo made his 170-pound debut in June when he took on Muslim
Salikhov at UFC Fight Night 189. The decision loss to Salikhov
ended a three-fight win streak for the Brazilian, who beat Bobby Green
and John
Makdessi on the scorecards before knocking Jai Herbert
out in July 2020. A longtime UFC vet that made his organizational
debut in 2012 after the first season of “The Ultimate Fighter:
Brazil,” the 43-year-old has competed at middleweight and
lightweight in his tenure, dropping down from 185 pounds to 155
after his first appearance.
Grant made his professional debut a bit over a year before Trinaldo
arrived to the UFC, and made his way to the company after a
knockout on the second season of Dana White’s Contender Series. A trio of wins
over Carlo
Pedersoli Jr., Alan Jouban
and Stefan
Sekulic are interspersed between a knockout defeat to Daniel
Rodriguez and a decision loss to Zak Ottow.
“The Body Snatcher” has never earned a submission victory, with all
of his stoppages coming by way of knockout.
UFC Fight Night 196 goes down in the UFC Apex in Las Vegas on Oct.
23. The main event sees a pair of recently defeated middleweight
title challengers square off when Paulo Costa
takes on Marvin
Vettori. A co-headliner has not yet been declared, although
featured fights include a featherweight scrap between Alex
Caceres and Seung Woo
Choi, a middleweight tilt pitting Jun Yong
Park against Gregory
Rodrigues and a strawweight affair between Jessica-Rose
Clark and Joselyne
Edwards.
