BJ PENN out of retirement confirmed

http://mmajunkie.com/2016/01/ex-champ-b-j-penn-ends-retirement-but-ufc-boss-still-unsure-on-details

As expected former two-division champ and 2015 UFC Hall of Fame inductee B.J. Penn has ended his retirement. What’s next, though? That’s still to be determined.

During a recent callout of rival Nik Lentz (25-7-2 MMA, 9-4-1 UFC) for a potential bout in March at UFC 197, Penn (16-10-2 MMA, 12-9-2 UFC) seemed to suggest he was ready to return to the cage for the first time since 2014, when he suffered a loss to Frankie Edgar and subsequently announced his retirement.

Today, Penn told “The MMA Hour” he’s officially returning to the cage, and the former welterweight and lightweight champ is focusing his efforts on the featherweight belt. But when reached today by MMAjunkie, UFC President Dana White confirmed he’s talked to Penn about a return and supports the idea, but he said nothing has been decided for the next step.

“(It’s) true,” White wrote via text message when contacted by MMAjunkie. “But I don’t know when or who he will fight.”

Penn, a 37-year-old Hawaiian who used to train out of his home state, also confirmed he’s now working with Jackson-Wink MMA in New Mexico with head trainer Greg Jackson.

White recently said Penn had been harassing him to return to action, though the UFC executive was noncommittal at the time.

Penn most recently appeared in the octagon in July 2014, when he suffered a third loss to Edgar. It marked Penn’s featherweight debut, but he had little to offer Edgar in the new weight class, and he was thoroughly beaten en route to a third-round TKO loss.

It pushed his winless streak to four and marked his sixth unsuccessful trip to the octagon in seven tries. Penn, who will be remembered as one of the best and most important lighter-weight fighters in MMA history, retired from the sport afterward, citing his inability to compete at the top level any longer.

Oh for fuck's sake.
Dana just needs to not give him any more fights. He basically retired Chuck on Chuck's behalf, because he never would've retired on his own. So why can't he do the same for BJ?

I have no interest in watching Penn get the absolute shit kicked out of him yet again.

im excited for him to fight. i think there are good match ups for him.great fights would be lentz, porier, chiesea, barbosa, dariush, duffy , felder, fergurson, dunham, gomi raging al, lauzon, miller, or pearson

but id love to see him fight gilbert melendez, nate diaz, or pettis.

shit make penn vs sanchez 2

id watch that

He'd get his shit pushed in in almost all of those fights.

No thank you.

I think Pettis or Diaz would be a great first fight for him.
Although, doesn't he want to fight FW?

Yeah I am not sure what exactly BJ has shown in the last 5 years that would make anyone think that there are ANY good fights for him in the UFC at all.

I think our definition of a good fight for him is one where he gets his ass kicked.

That's why I keep saying no fight is the only fight I wanna see.
I can do without seeing him get embarrassed by mid tier fighters or brutalized by top tier fighters. I don't know what he's thinking.

all of those fights would be excellent fights for penn.

the only ones who i think would beat him at this point is diaz,pettis, fergurson and probably melendez.

the other mentioned fighters would be good match ups against him

bj penn got banged up in his last fights but the guy fights all champions or top ranked guys in the division let him get in there with mid tier guys and lets see what he does. im sure penn is still a top 10 fighter who will go out there and fight. at 37 if he is really dedicated i personally believe that this is the last attempt for him to make a run.

Agree, and given how the UFC is run, if he goes in and steamrolls a top 10 guy it would not surprise me at all if they give him an immediate title shot.

Wow I couldn't disagree more. Imo he has looked pathetically slow and diminished for years. I think the mid tier guys would smoke him as well.

Agree with FistK.

I can't think of one top 10 fighter he would beat, at FW or LW.
And as far as him coming back and toiling around in the mid-tier shuffle and fighting guys ranked in the 15-25 range, what's the point?? He's BJ Penn, not some up and comer trying to make his mark.

Does anybody really want to see BJ Penn in the middle of Prelim cards on FS1 against TUF Brazil runner-ups?

when i think of Penn, the first thing i remember is his fight with Frankie. He looked amateurish. Was schooled and embarrassed. It looked like Frankie was fighting Hhoyce.
And only then i remember how great he was before that. I dont want my memory of him to be even more of a "outdated fighter". Unless he drastically revamped his game, let him enjoy the waves.

but there is a big difference fighting frankie edgar or nick lentz.

thats right he would get washed up against edgar as did 95% of the competition that went against edgar in all of his fights but that doesnt mean that penn still cant hang.

let him choose a weight class and commit to it. bj penn has no need to fight guys the size of rory macdonald, gsp, or john fitch. stylistically those are all hard match ups for him in a wrestling and range based ww division. i think 145 is ridiculous for him at 37 and i personally think 155 , a diet, and a dedicated training camp with yoda brings penn back into the mma world with open arms. with the exception of frankie penn was unstoppable at LW and if frankie stays at 145 i think there are tons of possibilities at 155 for penn. Besides Edgar who beat Penn at LW?

drainbamage wrote:

 Besides Edgar who beat Penn at LW?

Nobody, but do you realize he hasn't won a fight at LW in 6 years??
Or to put it another way; aside from beating equally washed-up Matt Hughes, he has not won a fight, period, in 6 years.

Triggerman99 wrote:

drainbamage wrote:

 Besides Edgar who beat Penn at LW?

Nobody, but do you realize he hasn't won a fight at LW in 6 years??
Or to put it another way; aside from beating equally washed-up Matt Hughes,  he has not won a fight, period, in 6 years.

This.

Its not the fact that he lost to Edgar, its how he looked. Which was brutally slow and completely washed up. I am still waiting to hear a fight he has had in the last 3-4 years that you could say, "he showed something in fight xxx that leads me to believe he's still got it"

FistK wrote:

Triggerman99 wrote:

drainbamage wrote:

 Besides Edgar who beat Penn at LW?

Nobody, but do you realize he hasn't won a fight at LW in 6 years??
Or to put it another way; aside from beating equally washed-up Matt Hughes,  he has not won a fight, period, in 6 years.

This.

Its not the fact that he lost to Edgar, its how he looked.  Which was brutally slow and completely washed up.  I am still waiting to hear a fight he has had in the last 3-4 years that you could say, "he showed something in fight xxx that leads me to believe he's still got it"

right! i do understand that. but do you realize with the exception of frankie he was fighting outside of his weight class and it wasnt against ben saunders or joe riggs no it was against champions and #1 ranked guys ( title eliminators )

i agree he got embarrassed. he looked terrible in those fights. but he showed he had heart, a solid chin, and the desire to fight. now if penn was going out there getting ko'd, subbed, breaking in the fight then i would be all for him to never fight again. however, he was stopped by frankie and all those other fights he stayed and competed. penn is doing what needs to be done and what should have been done a long time ago. he is committing. he moved training camps, has a new strength and conditioning coach and for those reasons i feel that this is good for him. this makes me excited to see him hopefully focused this time and making the necessary changes. but if he fights in FW i think that is just ridiculous. i personally believe he should be at LW

I think we will just have to agree to disagree on this one.

I never denied his ability to take a beating. He has a good chin yeah, its everything else that has diminished imo. I know he was fighting top level guys, but I am just going by what I saw with my eyes and what I saw looked terrible.

He has got my hopes up a few other times with the new training camps (AKA), new diets and training regimens (first marinovich and then dolce) and it was always the same result.

I dont want to sound too harsh on him, but I dont think he has a desire to fight i think he has a desire to make money and stay relevant, but he spent years not training as hard as everyone else and now it is too late even if he suddenly wanted to put in the effort (which I have my doubts about).

If he comes out and starches Lentz or whoever he fights i'll say I was wrong, but I would bet money it will be the same uninspiring type of performance I have seen from him for years.

drainbamage wrote:

right! i do understand that. but do you realize with the exception of frankie he was fighting outside of his weight class and it wasnt against ben saunders or joe riggs no it was against champions and #1 ranked guys ( title eliminators )

i agree he got embarrassed. he looked terrible in those fights. but he showed he had heart, a solid chin, and the desire to fight. now if penn was going out there getting ko'd, subbed, breaking in the fight then i would be all for him to never fight again. however, he was stopped by frankie and all those other fights he stayed and competed. penn is doing what needs to be done and what should have been done a long time ago. he is committing. he moved training camps, has a new strength and conditioning coach and for those reasons i feel that this is good for him. this makes me excited to see him hopefully focused this time and making the necessary changes. but if he fights in FW i think that is just ridiculous. i personally believe he should be at LW

I hope so, but I'm just not seeing it.
I know "Motivated BJ Penn" is as unbeatable as "Prime Chuck Liddell" and "Full Training Camp Chad Mendes", but I just think this is a case of too little too late.
I hope I'm wrong, but unless BJ fights a B-level fighter  (which in and of itself would be a failure), he's probably looking at another loss, which would make another chance a virtual impossibility.

did penn train at aka? i thought him changing camps was the first time for him.