Just two years removed from challenging Anderson Silva for the middleweight title, Patrick Cote has been released by the UFC. The former top 185-pound contender confirmed the news on his Twitter feed on Wednesday.
Cote (13-7, 4-7 UFC) lost a unanimous decision to Tom Lawlor on Saturday at UFC 121 in Anaheim, Calif. He was taken down by Lawlor in all three rounds and never could mount any type of offense, losing 30-27 on all three judges' scorecards.
The bout against Lawlor was just Cote's second since suffering a bad knee injury against Silva at UFC 90 in October 2008. In that fight, Silva blew out his knee in the third round, giving Silva a TKO win. After knee surgery and 18 months on the shelf, Cote returned at UFC 113 in May in front of his hometown Montreal fans, but he was submitted by Alan Belcher in the second round.
Cote has never lost outside the UFC, but he didn't get his first win in the promotion until his fourth stint. He lost a unanimous decision to Tito Ortiz in his UFC debut at UFC 50 in October 2004. He then dropped a pair of fights to Joe Doerksen and Chris Leben in 2005 before again returning to other promotions for wins.
Cote got his next shot courtesy of Season 4 of "The Ultimate Fighter," the "comeback" season for fighters who had been in the promotion previously, but hadn't been able to stick around. Cote reached the middleweight finals, but lost to Travis Lutter.
But at UFC 67 in February 2007, Cote started to turn things around. He beat Scott Smith, then beat Jason Day outside the organization, then returned for knockout wins over Kendall Grove and Drew McFedries and a decision win over Ricardo Almeida to get his shot at Silva.
Cote, 30, gave no indication of what his next plans were, but as a former UFC title challenger, he is likely to be sought after by other promotions.
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