MANCHESTER, England – Caolan Loughran hasn’t seen enough out of Payton Talbott to warrant all his buzz.
Talbott (9-0 MMA, 3-0 UFC) continued to live up to his hype after a 19-second knockout of Yannis Ghemmouri at UFC 303 in July.
Loughran (9-1 MMA, 1-1 UFC) thinks Talbott is skilled, but was particularly critical of his UFC debut win over Nick Aguirre, in which he was taken down twice and controlled before ultimately winning by third-round submission.
“Payton Talbott is a good fighter – 100 percent a good fighter,” Loughran told reporters, including MMA Junkie, at the UFC 304 media day. “Fair play to him going well, but Jesus Christ, man: Cool the jets. I watched his debut. Whenever (Conor) McGregor was coming up, people were saying when he fights a grappler, he’ll get smashed. When (Sean) O’Malley was coming up, when he fights a grappler, he’ll get smashed. But it was speculation, really. We hadn’t seen it. I watched his debut, some lad (Aguirre) – I don’t know who the guy was – comes out, takes him down, takes the back, flattens him out, gasses.
“Comes out second round, gassed again, finds himself on his back. I’m like, ‘Jeez, lad, you’re giving your back every time.’ He is a good fighter – 100 percent and fair play to him. He sparked that kid (Yanis) Ghemmouri who pulled out on me Tuesday morning. I would urge anyone who’s watching this to hit pause and watch UFC France – there’s a video of him warming up for that fight – before you blow Payton up over that win. He is good, but he’s getting a wee bit too much hype at the weight class. There’s definitely tougher fights at 135 for less hype.”
Loughran will look to make it two straight when he takes on short-notice replacement Jake Hadley (10-3 MMA, 2-3 UFC) in Saturday’s UFC 304 (pay-per-view, ESPN2, ESPN+) prelims at Co-op Live in Manchester, England.
He expects to run through Hadley – who will be moving up to bantamweight for the fight, then he’s open to fighting Talbott next.
“If the UFC want me to do that at the end of this year or the next, absolutely no f*cking problem,” Loughran said. “I’ll fight Payton Talbott next, no problem.”
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 304.
