Salt Lake City – UFC welterweight Joaquin Buckley looks at long time UFC veteran Stephen Thompson as a stepping stone that could launch him into a title fight soon as he prepares to fight him at UFC 307 on Saturday.
“At the end of the day I really feel like this win, for me, is definitely going to put me in position where I can fight for a title one day,” Buckley told reporters including Cageside Press on Wednesday.
Buckley (19-6) comes into the fight in Utah on a 4-fight win streak. Victories over Andre Fialho, Alex Morono, Vicente Luque and Nursulton Ruziboev set him up for a date with ‘Wonderboy’.
Thompson is regarded as one of the nicer guys in the UFC, but Buckley doesn’t buy it. He’s said recently that the energy from ‘Wonderboy’ has been different now that they’re set to fight.
“Have my own interactions, but obviously if you’re trying to fight somebody and you want to get in the cage with them the energy going to be a little bit off,” he said.
“The energy going to be a little bit different. So that’s what I felt. It wasn’t the same type of interaction we had before when we didn’t have a fight coming up. When he heard that I wanted to fight and I wanted to get in the cage with him he started acting a little bit different. I can understand.”
Watch the entire media day scrum with Joaquin Buckley above. He faces Stephen Thompson at UFC 307 on Saturday night.
