UFC 268 was Colby Covington’s second crack at undisputed welterweight gold. Unfortunately for “Chaos” he fell short on the scorecards with a close unanimous decision loss.
But in his mind, Covington remains ardent in the belief that he was the real winner. And he’s not just talking about his rematch with Usman in early November, but even in their first fight in 2019 where he lost via fifth-round TKO.
“I beat him in both fights, in multiple rounds. The last fight was clearly mine,” Covington told MMA Fighting in a recent interview. “I had him so hurt in the fourth round that he shouldn’t have made it out.
“He’s lucky he got the one-minute break. But he hasn’t proven he’s the better fighter. He needs to come out and dominate to show he’s the best fighter, he hasn’t done that. Cool, you want to come out and tell people you’re the champion and that you’re better than me, but deep down inside, everybody knows the truth.”
Covington may not have the official champion title, but he’s proclaimed himself as the “People’s Champ” with some merchandise to boot. He now wants a best-of-seven championship series with “The Nigerian Nightmare” to settle the score.
“If you look at the body of work over those 10 rounds, I’m easily up six [rounds] to four — maybe even seven to three,” he said. “Just because I don’t have some plastic title that they award and hand out, okay, that’s cool. That’s what you guys think. Let’s go ask the people who is their champion.
“I’m the people’s champion, and I’m showing up for the people. I’m just getting started for the people. They’ve seen nothing yet. I’ve got a show and entertainment to give them to make their lives that much better.”
“I’m a better fighter than him, [but] we’re so evenly matched that that’s a fight that needs to play out over a championship series — a best-of-seven. That makes sense to do because it’s such a close fight on paper.
“We have so many similar attributes in MMA, with our game plans, and our styles. I think if we fought seven times, I beat him four [times].”
Covington’s also been angling for a fight against his former ATT teammate Dustin Poirier, and he’s already made the gamesmanship more personal than it already was.
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