Oklahoma City — Former middleweight title challenger Jared Cannonier is going from one Brit to another when he faces Christian Leroy Duncan at UFC Oklahoma City this Saturday.
The co-main event fight has Cannonier (18-9) coming in off a loss to Michael “Venom” Page, with the English striker claiming a decision in their match-up, though he doesn’t see much similarity between the two contests.
“Hell no, I want to win all three rounds,” he told Cageside Press on Wednesday.
“I guess you can say this is my redemption fight against the UK,” Cannonier went on to add. “We always want to win every fight. I’m not making any association between this and the last. Any associations that I do make is because I’m game-planning to overcome.”
A former heavyweight and light heavyweight, Cannonier has done his best work at 185lbs. Yet in recent times, fighters like Alex Pereira, Paulo Costa, and Robert Whittaker have gone the opposite direction, moving up to 205lbs (and in Pereira’s case, heavyweight).
Asked whether he’d thought about moving back up himself, Cannonier told us that he had, “but the weight cut [at middleweight] isn’t hard. It’s not hard at all. Maybe for my last few fights, I may not do a weight cut, get in there and bang it out with the big boys again. Bigger boys again. Maybe get that rematch with Rob.”
Former UFC middleweight champion Robert Whittaker is just one of the former 185’ers who have moved up to light heavyweight, winning his debut in the weight class this past weekend with a knockout of Nikita Krylov.
Asked for his thoughts on how the divisions he’s been part of have grown over the years, Cannonier noted that the sport is still relatively young, with “The Killa Gorilla” himself debuting on Jones vs. Cormier 1.
“Eleven years later, things are quite different. We’ve seen a lot of guys come and go, and I think there’s going to be more to come. The sport is still young, there’s still more to be discovered. More Conor McGregors if you will.”
Watch the full UFC Oklahoma City media day appearance by Jared Cannonier above.
