MMA Junkie with the rather surprising news:
MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) has learned from sources close to the event that heavyweight Yohan Banks (2-1 MMA, 2-0 SF) was not approved by the Florida State Boxing Commission as an opponent for Bobby Lashley (4-0 MMA, 0-0 SF), and the former WWE star is still without an opponent for the event.
An FSBC representative said the decision to decline Banks as an opponent for Lashley was made based on a review of the fighters’ records, at which point the commission “determined that the bout was not competitive.”
Banks is coming off an 18 second knockout win for Strikeforce in 2008. The fact that it’s been well over a year since he fought and the fact that Lashley has been moving up in competition made this feel like a mismatch all along but it is very rare to see a commission step up for a major promotion’s event and say that a fight is so non-competitive that they won’t allow it.
Strikeforce is now in the awkward position of having to find an opponent competitive enough for Florida to allow while also finding someone willing to take the fight on roughly two weeks notice. Personally, I wouldn’t be shocked to see Strikeforce try to push Lashley’s bout back to the CBS card and move the Jay Hieron vs. Joe Riggs bout up to the main card.