Former UFC interim heavyweight title contender Curtis Blaydes is already planning for a life after he is done with the promotion.
The 35-year-old was last in action against Josh Hokit at UFC 327, which he lost. The fight won the Fight of the Night bonus, and that pocketed Blaydes $100,000, but he knows his time is coming to an end in MMA.
Speaking to James Lynch, ‘Razor’ brought up how he sees his time in combat sports coming to an end:
“The older I get, the more I think about how I want this road to end.”
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He brought up a couple of names that he wanted to replicate, and he planned to end his career with Dana White’s promotion:
“I look at guys like Drew Dober, like Neil Magny, I want to be in the UFC as long as I can, I want to end with the UFC. I want to have a legacy like theirs. I think that’s a very achievable goal.”
Blaydes also brought up a possible boxing fight. Many MMA stars have transitioned to boxing with varying degrees of success.
‘Razor’ also wants to do the same, but just for one fight, and that too against former UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou:
“I could see myself at the end, maybe taking a random boxing match. Maybe I’ll get to do boxing against [Francis] Ngannou if he’s active still. Something like that, just on the way out, but in terms of MMA, I do believe that I will only be with the UFC.”
Check out Curtis Blaydes speaking about his boxing match below:
Ngannou left the UFC after being unable to negotiate a new contract, but he has done pretty well since. He almost beat Tyson Fury in his debut boxing match, but was knocked out by Anthony Joshua in his second outing.
‘The Predator’s’ last fight was an MMA bout on the Netflix card, where he beat Philipe Lins in the first round.
Francis Ngannou vs. Jon Jones next?
Jon Jones was in attendance as he saw Francis Ngannou defeat Philipe Lins at the Netflix MMA card.
Jones also has had troubles with the UFC regarding his next fight, and the pair seem keen on facing off outside of the promotion.
‘Bones’ also spoke about needing to break his contract with the UFC to possibly fight Ngannou. However, UFC legend Chael Sonnen believes that the pair don’t want to fight, and are using the contract issue as an excuse:
“There is no contract stopping them from fighting. I know you are told differently. Stop! They can fight right now. But they don’t want to fight. Back when Dana [White] was going to make the fight, they didn’t wanna fight. They don’t actually wanna get in there with each other. That’s not fun. They just want to make sure that they have the respect of the audience.”
Edited by Saiyed Adeem Karim
