Seth Petruzelli (12-4, 0-2 UFC) — who became notorious in 2008 for knocking out Kimbo Slice in 14 seconds, then doing a radio interview where he appeared to suggest he was paid to keep the fight standing, which pretty much led to the demise of EliteXC — is returning to the Octagon. The Silverback announced the news on his Twitter page earlier today, confirming that he will compete at UFC 116: Lesnar vs. Carwin (July 3, Las Vegas) against new UFC acquisition Ricardo Romero. Petruzelli has only competed twice since his unexpected KO of the Miami Pound Machine, most recently submitting Ryan White last month at BAMMA 3 in Birmingham, England, a fight which he has still not been paid for.

Petruzelli’s relationship with the UFC first began in 2005, when he was a contestant on TUF 2, eventually being eliminated by Brad Imes in the heavyweight semi-finals. Following the show, Petruzelli dropped consecutive fights to Matt Hamill and Wilson Gouveia as a light-heavyweight before being officially released by the UFC in 2007. Since then, he’s racked up four straight wins by first-round stoppage, opened a Smoothie King franchise as well as his own MMA gym, and was walked on a leash by Tom Lawlor at UFC 100. If that isn’t a resume worthy of a second chance, we don’t know what one is.  

After the jump: UFC 116′s full lineup, and a picture of Seth and Tom that you’ll probably wish you hadn’t seen.


MAIN CARD
Brock Lesnar vs Shane Carwin (for undisputed heavyweight title)
Wanderlei Silva vs. Yoshihiro Akiyama (MW)
Chris Lytle vs. Matt Brown (WW)
Krzysztof Soszynski vs. Stephan Bonnar (LHW)
George Sotiropoulos vs. Kurt Pellegrino (LW)

SPIKE TV PRELIMS
Brendan Schaub vs. Chris Tuchscherer (HW)
Kendall Grove vs. Jon Madsen vs. Karlos Vemola (HW)
Seth Petruzelli vs. Ricardo Romero (LHW)