Somehow, Justin Gaethje didn’t enjoy his war with Michael Chandler.
Gaethje (23-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC) outlasted Chandler (22-7 MMA, 1-2 UFC) in a three-round barnburner at UFC 268 in November, a matchup that was named MMA Junkie’s “Fight of the Year.” It was widely regarded as one of the best fights in the promotion’s history, but Gaethje wasn’t too pleased with his performance.
He explains why.
“To be completely honest with you, I feel like that was kind of a boring fight when I was in there,” Gaethje told BT Sport. “Yeah, it just makes no sense. It’s the first time I’ve ever wanted to win more than to knock somebody out. So yeah, it was not good. I didn’t like it. I want to go back to just wanting to hurt somebody and finish them. But now that I have won and I got my title shot, I can go back to how it should be.”
The win positioned Gaethje as the No. 1 contender in the UFC’s lightweight division and the former interim champion is expected to challenge current titleholder Charles Oliveira (32-8 MMA, 20-8 UFC) next.
With the promotion announcing the title fight between light heavyweight champ Glover Teixeira and Jiri Prochazka for a rumored Brazil card on May 7, Gaethje would love to face Oliveira in enemy territory.
“I want to go down to Brazil; I want to fight in the chaos,” Gaethje said. “If you go back and listen to my early interviews, I said I wanted to go to the enemy territory like Brazil and fight in that chaos. So them screaming ‘I’m gonna die,’ 20,000 people, I am 100 percent confident that when I’m done, they’ll love me.”
