FanHouse Jorge Santiago

November has been an odd month for middleweights.

The UFC's middleweight division is basically taking the month off, with the undisputed No. 1 middleweight in the world, UFC champion Anderson Silva, nursing an elbow injury and hinting that he doesn't think any of the UFC's other top middleweights are worthy opponents.

Meanwhile, two big middleweight fights happened in other promotions, but they didn't quite go according to plan: Jake Shields beat Jason "Mayhem" Miller to win the Strikeforce middleweight title in a fight that left the crowd booing, while Mamed Khalidov shocked Sengoku middleweight champion Jorge Santiago.

And the guy who's probably the best middleweight after Silva -- Dan Henderson -- doesn't have a contract at the moment and isn't sure if he'll be fighting for the UFC or Strikeforce in 2010. So my list of the Top 10 middleweights in MMA shows a division in flux.

Sengoku middleweight champion Jorge Santiago and top contenders in the promotion's featherweight and lightweight divisions are set for action on Saturday at Sengoku 11 at the Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo, Japan.

Sengoku 11 is World Victory Road's final show before it changes its name on New Year's Eve to "Sengoku Raiden Championship," tacking on a word meaning thunder (rai) and lightning (den). Below are the results from Friday's weigh-ins and the final lineup in reverse order .

I've been banging the drum for a couple years saying the UFC needs to give Yushin Okami a shot at middleweight champion Anderson Silva. You won't be hearing that from me anymore.

After Chael Sonnen thoroughly dominated Okami with a unanimous decision win on Saturday night at UFC 104, Okami took a tumble in my rankings of the top 10 middleweights in mixed martial arts. So how far did Okami fall, and what does the middleweight picture look like now? My rankings are below.

Sengoku middleweight champ Jorge Santiago will face Mamed Khalidov in a non-title fight and Kevin Randleman will take on Stanislav Nedkov at Sengoku 11 on Nov. 7 in Tokyo, World Victory Road announced today.

Santiago (21-7), who last fought in January when he captured the Sengoku title over Kazuo Misaki, has been on a tear the past two years after leaving the UFC late 2006 on two knockout losses. Since, the American Top Team fighter has won Strikeforce and Sengoku tournaments and would have looked to extend his win streak to ten in August against Vitor Belfort until the cancellation of the Affliction "Trilogy" event.

Sengoku middleweight champion Jorge Santiago, featherweight GP finalist Michihiro Omigawa and Strikeforce light heavyweight Kevin Randleman will compete on the Sengoku 11 card on Nov. 7 at the Ryōgoku Kokugikan in Tokyo, Japan.

World Victory Road announced the initial details for Sengoku 11 at a small conference Friday at the J-ROCK workout studio in Tokyo, where Omigawa was also present to conduct a workout for the media.

In the above video, Jorge Santiago describes his preparation for his scheduled August 1 fight against Vitor Belfort at Affliction Trilogy, and as you can hear, he's training hard and preparing diligently for what may be the biggest moment of his MMA career.

Except that it might not happen.

Most of the best middleweights in mixed martial arts are in the UFC, just as most of the best fighters in every weight class from bantamweight to heavyweight are under contract to Zuffa. But as I post my new list of the Top 10 middleweights in MMA, a list topped by UFC middleweight champ Anderson Silva, I want to commend Affliction for putting together the best middleweight fight possible outside the Octagon: Vitor Belfort vs. Jorge Santiago.

LAS VEGAS -- When we last saw Vitor Belfort and Matt Lindland in the same scene together, it was with the former separating the latter from consciousness at Affliction's last event, January's Day of Reckoning show.

Apparently, the two longtime MMA veterans had no problem putting the past behind them, as FanHouse obtained this photo of the onetime combatants together taken during UFC 100 week at the Xtreme Couture gym in Las Vegas.

Last week, UFC President Dana White surprised a few people by saying that he'd like to put together a matchup between middleweight champion Anderson Silva and current Affliction middleweight Vitor Belfort.

The statement was surprising because White's been burned in the past announcing matchups that never happened and deals that fell through. Most recently, he did a verbal contract with Mirko Cro Cop prior to UFC 99, but the Croatian star bolted after one fight. Most famously, he had then-PRIDE fighter Wanderlei Silva enter the octagon at UFC 61 to announce a matchup with UFC superstar Chuck Liddell. But talks soon fizzled and White wasn't able to put the two together until after he bought PRIDE and acquired Silva's contract.

So what do those situations tell us about Belfort?

Is Vitor Belfort headed back to the UFC? During Saturday night's "Ultimate Finale" telecast on Spike, UFC president Dana White told Amir Sadollah during an "Inside the Octagon" segment that he is considering booking the former UFC light heavyweight champion in a middleweight title fight against current champion, Anderson Silva.

"If his head is right, he's a dangerous, dangerous guy," White said. "I think that would be a great a match-up."