Former UFC heavyweight champion Fabricio Werdum fought out his contract with a submission win over Alexander Gustafsson at UFC on ESPN 14 on July 26 on Fight Island, Abu Dhabi. It was widely believed he would end up at Bellator MMA, where a rematch with heavyweight GOAT Fedor Emelianenko was a natural matchup. In 2010, Werdum broke Fedor’s unparalleled heavyweight streak of 28 fights without a loss. However, during a recent interview with the Portuguese language Combate, Werdum said negotiations with Bellator fell through. So the next stop may be the Professional Fighters League’s heavyweight tournament, with its $1,000,000 prize.

I didn’t close the deal with Bellator because they wanted me to rematch Fedor Emelianenko in my first fight,” said Werdum, as translated by Lucas Rezende for BE. “I respect Fedor a lot. I can’t say he turned the fight down, but this negotiation with Fedor didn’t go through because of their side. Bellator wanted that to be the first fight to cause an impact, then we would close a deal for four or five more fights.

I’ve also heard that [my manager] Ali Abdelaziz has been talking with the PFL and I might join their tournament. I don’t know if people know it that well in Brazil, but it’s like a tournament. You enter, you fight four times and if you win those four fights, you win one million dollars, plus your purse. You win the purse that’s been previously established and the one million dollars. That made me pretty interested. It’s good, right?

Werdum is now 43, and fought 34 times over 18 years, 23 if you include Jiu-Jitsu competitions. He told Combate he has been giving thought to when he will retire.

A while ago I only saw myself fighting twice more,” he said. “Because of everything that’s happened in my career. I’ve been fighting for 23 years. I had some ups and downs. I always say that life oscilates. Not just in fighting, it’s like that for every profession. I entertained that thought, but after my huge win over Gustafsson in Abu Dhabi. I was so focused for so many reasons. That was special. It was the last fight on my UFC contract, So I had to come out on top, walk out through the front door. And I really did. Him being a 33-year-old and me being 43. I think the UFC’s plan was like: ‘Let’s move Gustafsson to heavyweight. Werdum is leaving, it’ll be good for the event, right?’ I think that’s normal, it’s a business. But I wanted to change the plans, to leave with a victory, a good one.

Now I really think about fighting for two more years. I think I have two more years left in me to fight, because I don’t have any major injuries. I have broken fingers several times, toes, too. Nothing really serious, though, No bigger bones. I haven’t really taken many hits in my career. Because of jiu-jitsu, because of the way I learned personal defense, I was able to defend myself better than others, you know? Of course, I’ve been knocked out before, but it was little damage considering I’ve been doing this for 23 years. So I still have more to show. I think two years will be enough time.