No Ben Saunders? How 'bout Benson Henderson for UFC Fight Night 62, 'Smooth' asks?

Benson Henderson

Benson Henderson made short notice really pay off on Valentine’s Day. Now the “Smooth” one wants to put his heart into a trip to Brazil.

With the recent news that Ben Saunders (18-6-2 MMA, 6-3 UFC) is out of the UFC Fight Night 62 co-main event against Erick Silva (17-5 MMA, 5-4 UFC), less than two weeks away, Henderson (22-5 MMA, 10-3 UFC) wants to again jump in on short notice to save the day.

UFC Fight Night 62 takes place March 21 at Maracanazinho Gymnasium in Rio de Janeiro. The main card airs on FOX Sports 1 following prelims on FOX Sports 2 and UFC Fight Pass.

Three weeks ago, Henderson stepped in for Stephen Thompson and moved up to welterweight from his longtime lightweight home to take on Brandon Thatch in the UFC Fight Night 60 main event. He took that bout on two weeks’ notice, and that fight came less than a month after a close split-decision loss to Donald Cerrone at UFC Fight Night 59.

Henderson was an underdog against Thatch, who was fighting in front of his home fans. But he snapped the first two-fight skid of his career and rallied for a fourth-round submission victory and “Fight of the Night” honors.

When news of Saunders’ injury broke, Henderson took to his Twitter account to throw his name in the hat to take on Silva, which would again save the top end of a UFC “Fight Night” card – and would give the former lightweight champ three fights in the first three months of 2015.

“I’m in,” Henderson said on Twitter.

After his loss to Cerrone in January in Boston, a fight Henderson believed he had won – as did most major media outlets scoring the fight – Henderson told analyst Joe Rogan in a post-fight interview that he wanted back in as soon as possible to start to erase the sting of the setback.

That’s what happened with the Thatch booking, and now Henderson apparently wants to take former foe Cerrone’s fight-often philosophy.

In Silva, he would get an opponent who has won bonus awards in three straight fights and six of his past seven. But since his entry into the UFC in 2011, he has yet to win back-to-back fights, alternating between wins and losses for the entirety of his nine-fight UFC run. Most recently, he rebounded from a “Fight of the Night” TKO loss to Matt Brown in the UFC Fight Night 40 headliner to choke out Mike Rhodes in the first round at UFC Fight Night 58 in Brazil, which got him a $50,000 “Performance of the Night” bonus.

The current UFC Fight Night 62 lineup includes:

MAIN CARD (FOX Sports 1, 10 p.m. ET)

• Ryan LaFlare vs. Demian Maia
• Erick Silva vs. TBA
• Gilbert Burns vs. Alex Oliveira
• Tony Martin vs. Leonardo Santos
• Shayna Baszler vs. Amanda Nunes
• Andre Fili vs. Godofredo Pepey

PRELIMINARY CARD (FOX Sports 2, 8 p.m. ET)

• Akbarh Arreola vs. Francisco Trinaldo
• Katsunori Kikuno vs. Kevin Souza
• Drew Dober vs. Leandro Silva
• Cain Carrizosa vs. Leonardo Mafra

PRELIMINARY CARD (UFC Fight Pass, 7 p.m. ET)

• Jorge de Oliveira vs. Christos Giagos
• Fredy Serrano vs. Bentley Syler

For more on UFC Fight Night 62, stay tuned to the UFC Rumors section of the site.