While it’s been known that Max Holloway passed on a reported offer to have his “Champion vs. Champion” fight against Jose Aldo at the first-ever UFC event at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York on February 11th, what wasn’t known was what Aldo’s reaction to having yet another title fight pulled out from underneath him.
Aldo, who was promised the next shot at Conor McGregor and the linear 145-pound UFC title with his win over Frankie Edgar at the landmark UFC 200 show in July once again became the “king” of the Featherweight division in the UFC when the promotion decided to make good on their promise to take one of McGregor’s two titles after the UFC 205 PPV at Madison Square Garden in New York City in November.
For his part, Holloway earned the interim UFC Featherweight Championship by defeating former UFC and WEC Lightweight Champion in impressive fashion at UFC 206 earlier this month, however reportedly passed on a quick turnaround at the aforementioned 2/11 date in Brooklyn, citing a number of reasons.
In a new in-depth interview with Ariel Helwani available at MMAFighting.com, the reigning recognized UFC Featherweight Champion Aldo broke his silence on the matter.
“This fight was set,” the Brazilian said of his expected champion vs. champion showdown with Holloway. “We had told the UFC we wanted to fight on that date. For us, it was set.”
Aldo would elaborate and as he has in the past, would go on to break down exactly how things were organized behind-the-scenes only for things to happen completely different than planned.
“The UFC said, OK, and they asked that we not discuss it any further before UFC 206. I was told the winner of the Max Holloway and Anthony Pettis fight would be my opponent in Brooklyn, and my understanding was that both Holloway and Pettis were told the same thing before their fight.”
The former ten year unbeaten Aldo, who was the first-ever champion of the UFC’s 145-pound division and now stands as the division’s only two-time champion in history, went on to break down some of the different reasons why Holloway was unwilling to have the fight on 2/11 in Brooklyn that Aldo claims was already agreed upon.
“After that fight, Holloway said a bunch of different things,” said Aldo. “First, I heard he twisted his ankle and wouldn’t have time to heal. Then I heard he had a trip booked to Disney World with his kids and he wouldn’t be able to reschedule. Then I heard his gym is closed during the holidays and he wouldn’t have enough time to train.”
“So he’s basically going around, talking a lot of trash, saying a lot of bullsh*t and acting like a punk,” Aldo added. “He’s just talking sh*t.”
