St. Louis – UFC welterweight Joaquin Buckley would be more than happy to take the main event spot at UFC St. Louis on Saturday night, but he gets Nursulton Ruziboev in the co-main instead.
“Derrick said he trying to pass that little main event spot up to me,” Buckley told reporters on Wednesday as he sat down for media day.
“Let’s get it.”
When a reporters told him he thought Lewis just doesn’t want to fight five rounds.
“I mean I’m not going to do five rounds either, but it’d be nice to be a main event though,” he said.
Buckley (18-6) had been asking to fight in the main event of UFC St. Louis since he fought in Atlantic City in March. Then he took the mic at the UFC 300 press conference to take another shot at getting the main event slot.
“That’s just how the universe works. When you speak things out and when you’re unafraid, and when you’re confident, and when you actually work towards things, the universe will reward you,” said Buckley.
“Dana (White) obviously hearing that I want to fight in my hometown city, and obviously having somebody like me on the card, he only knew that the numbers was going to go up. I’m glad he took the opportunity by putting me on the card.”
On Saturday night he gets Ruziboev who makes his return to the welterweight division, first in the UFC, which begs the question about the weight cut.
“They had to find somebody that wasn’t even a welterweight fighter to get on there. For me it was just the opportunity of actually being able to fight. With Nursulton I don’t know if he’s going to make the weight, but it don’t even matter,” he said.
“I’ve already adjusted my mindset that no matter what he steps on the scale as, as long as we got a dancing partner, as long as we got an opponent, we good. Going to knock this bou out come May 11th.”
Watch the entire media day scrum with Joaquin Buckley above. He takes on Nursulton Ruziboev at UFC St. Louis on Saturday night.
