Beneil Dariush is happy to continue fighting the best, but admits being passed up for a title shot was frustrating.
Dariush (22-4-1 MMA, 16-4-1 UFC) has won eight in a row and most recently scored an impressive win over Mateusz Gamrot at UFC 280. With the win over Gamrot, Dariush expected to be next in line for a lightweight title shot, but that’s when featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski decided to chase dual-champion status.
As soon as Islam Makhachev (23-1 MMA, 12-1 UFC) claimed the vacant lightweight belt over Charles Oliveira in the UFC 280 headliner, he faced off with Volkanovski (25-1 MMA, 12-0 UFC) in the octagon to set up their super fight at UFC 284 on Feb. 11, leaving Dariush out of the title picture.
“In the moment, I felt like it was definitely weird, and I was frustrated – I’ll be honest with you,” Dariush said in an interview with the UFC. “I get why they did it – Volkanovski is the pound-for-pound king. But the timing was terrible for me. I seem very cool-headed, but if you push the right buttons or say the right things, I’ll probably try to take your head off right there. So after I found out the news and I cooled off, I said to myself, ‘What difference does it make? I just have to win my fights.’ It was all good, and look how well it turned out.”
So what’s next for Dariush? Waiting for the winner of Makhachev vs. Volkanovski is an option, but he knows that plan may not work out for him.
“I don’t know what UFC’s game plan is for me,” Dariush said. “I don’t know if I’m ever going to fight for that belt. I have the option of waiting and fighting the winner, but if Volkanovski wins and decides to defend his featherweight belt, I might end up waiting a whole year and maybe I end up fighting in 2024. I don’t think there is anybody who can jump in front of me right now, but my job is winning fights, so let’s fight Dustin Poirier or Charles Oliveira. March is a good timetable for me.”
Dariush sees Makhachev retaining his title against Volkanovski. But ultimately, he’s excited about the challenge of facing every elite fighter in the division.
“I believe Makhachev will win, but Volkanovski has the potential to do it,” Dariush said. “Stylistically, he has all the tools for the standup, but I don’t know his tools in the ground game. I don’t know how much he can improve in his camp. But it will be interesting to see how he handles Makhachev’s pressure. Right now, I’m leaning Makhachev, but I’m also just really excited to see such an interesting fight. Makhahcev is an unsolved puzzle and I want to solve it. But so is Volknaovski. No one has gotten close other than what Max (Holloway) did in the second fight.
“If they have a close fight, I’d love to fight them both, but I do want to fight Oliveira and I do want to fight Poirier. Basically, I want to fight everyone. I really just want to compete with the best in the world, and whatever order I fight these guys is fine with me. I don’t have a ton of time left in my career, so this is my chance.”
