At UFC 242, Paul Felder beat Edson Barboza in their rematch from 2015. It was a super close fight that ‘The Irish Dragon’ edged out by split-decision.
However, Barboza did not agree with the loss and says he planned on appealing the loss. For Paul Felder, he is upset by the fact Barboza wants to take the win away from him.
“I know he’s upset and I know that he has not had the best winning record lately, so I feel for him, I feel for his family and I know how much the money means to him,” Felder said on MMA Fighting’s EuroBash Podcast. “I know his wife even came out and said something like, ‘I have all these other opportunities, why can’t I go take them?’ With emotions and financial stuff, when you think you won the fight…we both thought we won that fight so I get it.
“Is it upsetting me, did it leave a bad taste in my mouth that these guys who I thought I was really cool with are basically saying that it was robbery? That’s what’s upsetting me most. If you just admitted that it was razor close and you felt you should’ve got the nod…yeah the judges are all over the place…but two of them scored it for me, not you. It sucks, I’ve been on the end of other split decisions, I’ve lost two split decisions in the UFC, so going into that decision I was nervous as hell. Look at his face, so was he. I know his guys were confident and they were yelling, ‘You’ve got this,’ but so was Duke [Roufus].
“We were all just trying to stay positive out there to keep guys from losing their minds in those situations. There is so much tension when you’re awaiting decisions, especially after a war like that. We beat the crap out of each other, I think that’s what upsets me most out of all of it: I just had this epic rematch with Edson Barboza—the No. 7 guys versus the No. 10 guy—and we go at it and it should’ve been Fight of the Night…we put on an even better battle than we did the first time and what are we all talking about? [We’re] arguing back and forth over who should’ve won and that’s really unfortunate.”
Paul Felder also says he feels disrespected by Edson Barboza doing it.
“Yeah I kind of do [feel disrespected], I’ll be honest with you. I can’t sit here and say that I don’t feel slighted in some way. So much of my social media…I should be talking about this win and being seventh in the world, instead I’ve got his fans trying to trash me.”
