Following his impressive first-round finish of UFC Bantamweight veteran Takeya Mizugaki at the recent UFC 202: Diaz vs. McGregor 2 mega-event, rising UFC 135-pound contender and Team Alpha Male standout Cody “No Love” Garbrandt apparently had a bullseye placed on him by fellow UFC 135-pound contender Bryan Caraway.
It was reported after the UFC 202 pay-per-view that Caraway immediately contacted UFC officials asking for the fight against Garbrandt. “No Love,” who spoke to Ariel Helwani on Monday’s edition of The MMA Hour, is claiming that Caraway turned down a fight with him twice in the past.
“That’s funny because that dude has turned me down twice. That guy turned me down twice. He’s a bigger b*tch than Dominick Cruz. He knows that I’m next in line for a title shot, now he wants to keep his name relevant. All these fighters want to throw their name in with me. They want to throw their name in with the best just to get a chance to get in there, because they know I’m the real deal, they know I’m going to be the next champion, they know I’m the big fight.
“But’s it’s funny, Bryan, you were supposed to be my last fight, but you said you were hurt and that’s why Takeya stepped up and took the fight. So he turned me down twice. The first time because I wasn’t ranked, then this time I think just because I was finally ranked and then he said ‘I was hurt.’ That was before all of this. So that’s funny that he wants to grow some balls and call me out.”
Garbrandt, who has been on an impressive win streak as of late, elaborated on the Caraway issue, claiming he is “not a fighter.” As he describes, Caraway is an opportunist who is attempting to get the most out of a win over a guy in Aljamain Sterling that he says was also “over-hyped.”
“Look, you can’t force fighters to fight. That guy isn’t a fighter. I don’t even know why he’s in the division. I really don’t. I think he should just go and hang it up and be a coach. He don’t want to fight anybody. He doesn’t. He doesn’t want to fight anybody. He got a win over a very over-hyped opponent last time and thinks that he deserves a title shot with that? I don’t think so.”
For highlights of Garbrandt’s first-round knockout of Mizugaki at UFC 202, watch the following video, which shows the finish of their fight by clicking here.
H/T to MMAFighting.com for the above quotes from Cody Garbrandt’s interview on “The MMA Hour.”
