Originally Posted by MMAJunkie

Leonard Garcia agrees to Sept. 10 bout with Jens Pulver


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After a recent title loss to WEC featherweight champion Urijah Faber, Jens Pulver (22-9-1) will look to reclaim top-contender status when he meets Leonard Garcia (11-3) Sept. 10 at WEC 36.

Garcia today told MMAjunkie.com (
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) that he's agreed to the bout, which could be finalized as early as this week.

The fight is slated for the televised main card of WEC's championship double-header, which takes place at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Fla.

The event, which features a title fight between Faber and Mike Brown, as well as a WEC middleweight title fight between champ Paulo Filho and Chael Sonnen, airs live on VERSUS.

Pulver, a former UFC champion who made his WEC debut in late 2007, suffered a unanimous-decision loss to Faber in June. The event, which drew record ratings, was arguably the biggest and most successful show in WEC history. Although Pulver remains one of the WEC's biggest names, he's lost three of his past four fights, which included recent UFC losses to B.J. Penn and Joe Lauzon.

During a recent interview with MMAjunkie.com, Pulver said he underwent minor elbow surgery after the event. He predicted an October return and said he wanted to fight former Shooto star Alexandre Franca Nogueira. Nogueira, though, recently tested positive for steroids following a recent loss to Jose Aldo and faces up to a year's suspension.

Instead, he'll get Garcia, who will fight for the first time since a February TKO victory over Hiroyuki Takaya. Soon after the win, though, the former UFC fighter was arrested for alleged involvement in a Texas-based drug ring. Garcia, who continually maintained that he was simply the victim of guilt by association, was recently cleared of all pending federal charges.

In a recent interview with MMAjunkie.com, he said he hung around with the wrong person three years ago and suffered the consequences. However, he's vowed to choose his friends much more carefully.

"You can't change things in your past," said Garcia. "But looking back, I knew what [that friend] was doing, and I shouldn't have been around him. But you get the dog, you get the fleas. ... Had I known I could be in this much trouble for hanging around with him, I would have never done it. Now if I see him, I'll definitely turn the other way."