{"id":67511,"date":"2013-08-28T09:39:47","date_gmt":"2013-08-28T16:39:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=67511"},"modified":"2022-02-06T12:52:26","modified_gmt":"2022-02-06T20:52:26","slug":"vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/ufcnews\/vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me\/","title":{"rendered":"Vitor Belfort: Sonnen &#8216;relieved&#8217; not to fight me"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-49302\" src=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"390\" height=\"270\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort.jpg 390w, https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort-300x207.jpg 300w, https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort-361x250.jpg 361w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 390px) 100vw, 390px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Vitor &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; Belfort (23-10 MMA, 12-6 UFC) was one of many fighters\u00a0to call out Chael Sonnen (29-13-1 MMA, 7-6 UFC) following Sonnen&#8217;s defeat of Mauricio &#8220;Shogun&#8221; Rua at UFC Fight Night 26 in Boston.<\/p>\n<p>While Chael told members of the media that he would be happy to take a fight with Belfort, &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; believes that Sonnen was more than likely relieved when the fight wasn&#8217;t made:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>&#8220;He was really relieved that the UFC didn\u2019t give him to me,&#8221; <\/em>Belfort said.<em> &#8220;He was like \u2018I\u2019m glad I don\u2019t have to fight Vitor.\u2019 We have friends in common and one time he was on his camp and (Sonnen) said \u2018one of the guys I\u2019d never like to fight is Vitor Belfort\u2019. I\u2019m cool, man. He\u2019s around, I\u2019m around. One day he\u2019ll have to face me. It\u2019ll be a great fight. One day. Who knows?&#8221;<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Belfort is set to rematch Dan Henderson (29-10 MMA, 6-4 UFC) this November at UFC Fight Night 32 in Goiania, Goias,\u00a0Brazil. As for &#8220;The American Gangster&#8221;, Sonnen is aiming to return to the cage at UFC 167 in November, although no opponent has been named for him at this time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Vitor &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; Belfort (23-10 MMA, 12-6 UFC) was one of many fighters\u00a0to call out Chael Sonnen (29-13-1 MMA, 7-6 UFC) following Sonnen&#8217;s defeat of Mauricio &#8220;Shogun&#8221; Rua at UFC Fight Night 26 in Boston. While Chael told members of the media that he would be happy to take a fight with Belfort, &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":49302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[2681],"tags":[199,252,9,16,1057],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Vitor Belfort: Sonnen &#039;relieved&#039; not to fight me | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/ufcnews\/vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vitor Belfort: Sonnen &#039;relieved&#039; not to fight me | BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Vitor &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; Belfort (23-10 MMA, 12-6 UFC) was one of many fighters\u00a0to call out Chael Sonnen (29-13-1 MMA, 7-6 UFC) following Sonnen&#8217;s defeat of Mauricio &#8220;Shogun&#8221; Rua at UFC Fight Night 26 in Boston. While Chael told members of the media that he would be happy to take a fight with Belfort, &#8220;The Phenom&#8221; [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/ufcnews\/vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"| BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/bjpenn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-08-28T16:39:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-02-06T20:52:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/vitor-belfort.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"390\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"270\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Chris Taylor\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@https:\/\/twitter.com\/CTaylor_96\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@bjpenndotcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Chris Taylor\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/ufcnews\/vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/ufcnews\/vitor-belfort-sonnen-relieved-not-to-fight-me\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Chris Taylor\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#\/schema\/person\/fe444b8007aa9105494afef8547151ff\"},\"headline\":\"Vitor Belfort: Sonnen &#8216;relieved&#8217; 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