Toronto, ON — Middleweight Chris Curtis came away from UFC 297 with a split decision win over Marc-Andre Barriault, fending off the Canadian who was looking to snag “The Action Man’s” spot in the top 15.
Ahead of the fight, Barriault had suggested Curtis was his ticket to the top 15, but as the veteran told Cageside Press post-fight, it was a ticket he didn’t get to cash.
“He did say I was his ticket. A lot of people buy tickets they never cash,” noted Curtis (31-10, 1NC). “It happens all the time, man. People call me a gatekeeper, like cool man, you still can’t come in.”
Asked what would make sense, working his way up the ladder, or taking on another fighter looking to break into the rankings, the 14th-ranked Curtis replied by saying that “I make a decent amount of money now, so I’ll just gladly keep beating up people who want to come in. I’m 36, my best friend is the title holder, I’m like ‘bro my life’s cool.’ I’ll gladly keep beating up people who want to come in. Because every time I win, my check goes up. So f*ck this, I’m here to just beat people up. There’s nothing else.”
“My aspirations are strange, man, I just want to fight people. I don’t want to worry about the politics and other sh*t. I just want to beat people up. That third round was the most fun I’ve had in a year. Excuse my language, but I always tell people, I’d rather fight than f*ck. And that was like better than f*cking right there. It was a great f*cking moment, guys. So if I can keep doing that and they’ll keep paying me more, f*ck it, what else am I going to do?”
Sticking around and fighting whoever worked out for Curtis’ best bud Sean Strickland, who lucked his way into a title fight with Israel Adesanya when Dricus Du Plessis was injured. Strickland then pulled off one of the biggest upsets of all time. Would Curtis jump at a similar opportunity?
“Can I fight Sean?” he asked in response, then suggested he would take the fight when asked if he would want to throw down with his best friend.
“He tried to kill me for free, I might as well collect a big check for it,” exclaimed Curtis. “Guys, understand that like, he’s like a brother to me; he’s also tried to murder me in practice. He’s tried to murder me outside of practice. We’ve been kicked out of three gyms for fist fighting each other. So if this sh*t is going to happen regardless, I might as well get paid. So yeah I would fight Sean in a heartbeat. He would try to kill me too, it’s fine. If he wins, he probably would win, motherf*cker’s huge, and I wake up, I’m still way richer than I was, so screw it. At this point, I’m just trying to fight [guys] and get paid.”
Chris Curtis made mention of the craziness of the Sean Strickland Fight Week, but wasn’t sure whether he’d prefer to just watch it from afar, rather than sharing the card.
“I don’t know, man. I’d rather not be around the screaming masses, that sh*t’s scary. When the guy was up on the stage [a fan rushed the stage during the pre-fight press conference on Thursday], I almost punched the kid, I almost Road House’d that kid off the stage,” said Curtis. “And I was deeply concerned that of a panel of fighters, no one else stood the f*ck up. I’m like, maybe I’m just from Ohio, but if someone runs toward you that you don’t know, you hit them. So that bothered me.”
“The insanity’s just been one thing but on the flip side, from being here, I get to see all of you have to deal with it. And man, he’s just been reaming you guys. It is crazy.”
Watch the full UFC 297 post-fight press conference with Chris Curtis above.
