Philadelphia — Coming off the first loss of his mixed martial arts career, middleweight Mansur Abdul-Malik looks to bounce back against Dustin Stoltzfus this Saturday at UFC 330 in Philadelphia, PA.
Abdul-Malik (9-1-1) was finished care of a Yousri Belgaroui knee back in March, and explained during this week’s UFC 330 media day that early on, he looked at what he could change coming out of that setback.
“Maybe early on, after the fight happened. It’s like of course, the mental perspective, you want to change everything. You want to change your lifestyle, you want to change your habits,” noted Abdul-Malik, who trains at MMA Masters, and will be fighting in his state of birth come Saturday night. “But then when I look at my lifestyle, I look at my habits, what really is there to change? I don’t party, I don’t drink, I don’t go out, I don’t have many friends. So it’s like what is there really to change? And the thing to change was myself.”
Abdul-Malik continued by saying that “I was going out there that last fight trying to be way too perfect. And there’s a lot of flaws in trying to be perfect. So my intention is just to go out and be me, and to fight like me. To be aggressive, to be playful, have a smile on my face. I feel like I was way too serious if anything. But all those things are secondary.”
“I lost to a fighter who was better than me, period. Point blank. But this time around, I have a new opportunity in front of me, and I’m excited to just perform. to just perform, to just be myself, have fun, and to engage.”
Despite having an undefeated record prior to that loss, Abdul-Malik says there was never really any pressure to stay unblemished. After all, he’s lost before, in wrestling. “It never really hit me like that. If it hit me in a certain type of way, it was like ‘that’s not me.’ I didn’t feel like that was the truest expression of myself. And every single time I compete, I want it to be the main thing for me, to just express myself and to be free. And I didn’t do that, but I have an opportunity to do that this weekend.”
The good news is, Abdul-Malik hasn’t taken a step back career-wise. He’s still got main card placement on a numbered event, after all.
“I don’t feel like I’ve lost. Of course that happened, I’m not negligent of that, it happened, that’s reality,” he added. “But I’m not that person. I’m not the same person I am when wins come. This is life, man. This is a brand new day, a brand new opportunity.”
Watch the full UFC 330 media day appearance by Mansur Abdul-Malik above.
