El Cucuy: I love Metro PCS, but that sign sucks

UFC lightweight Tony Ferguson holds the longest win streak in the ridiculously deep division, with eight. His last fight, at UFC Fight Night 91 on July 13, was scheduled to be vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov for the #1 contender spot. However, UFC newcomer Lando Vannata stepped in as a late replacement, and very nearly ended the streak.

Vannata dropped Ferguson with strikes, and appeared to be on the verge of victory. However, ‘El Cucuy’ came back, with his second second-round, Fight of the Night winning Darse choke in a row.

During a recent appearance on Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour, Ferguson explained what happened.

“I tried to straight out just box him, like, right handed, instead of just a funky Tony Ferguson fight,” said Ferguson, as transcribed by Shaun Al-Shatti for MMA Fighting. “I went in there, I fought him, I relied on my jab, and I basically just didn’t want to hurt the kid. He’s a young kid. I went in there and didn’t really look at him like an Edson Barboza or Khabib fight. I prepared for him like any other UFC fighter would, and he was tricky. The kid had good movement.

“You can’t take anything from the kid. He trained hard, and the guys over at Jackson-Wink prepared this kid for a very long time, so he was sharp. Preparing for a short-notice fight is dangerous, it doesn’t even matter who you are preparing for. Short-notice fights suck. I’ve been that guy who just came in and wrecked house, so I know that for a fact. So like I said, props to Lando, but we didn’t prepare for a stand-up fight, man. We prepared that as soon as I grabbed somebody, I was going to choke them out. Choking necks, cashing checks.”

“F*** no, I was teaching this kid a lesson the second round. He didn’t touch me in the second round. He pissed me off, dude. I went in there the first round, I was going to put him away nice and soft. No. Boom, he hit me good. I slipped a couple times. If you guys go back and watch it, no excuses, that Metro PCS sign sucks. I hate it. It’s slippery as hell. It’s stupid, take that s*** out of there. I love Metro PCS, I swear, but they need to fix that sign. It’s slippery as heck. I slipped a couple times on the mat and you can watch the punches fly by my head, and I actually only take like one solid uppercut shot and I actually granby’d out because I knew what was coming next, which is that right cross and a couple other ones.

“As soon as I get to that position I was like, look, this kid has absolutely zero jiu-jitsu. I could feel it. I was like, nope. His scrambles were good, but no jiu-jitsu. I was like, we need to get back to business. Coach gets me in the second round, he looks at me, he’s like, ‘get you s*** together, man!’ And I’m like, I know! Alright! Then I’m like, alright cool, I get my s*** together and I’m like alright, I start working to get some other stuff, I start being fluid, and I start doing more Tony stuff. As soon as I snagged his neck, it was over, man.”

However, Vannata had a slick comeback to the slip talk.

https://twitter.com/GroovyLando/status/772932417384349696

Ferguson also discussed his next fight, vs. former division champion Rafael dos Anjos in November.

“I want to test my skills up against somebody who had the belt,” said Ferguson. “I think this is where my skillsets are at. I’m an Ultimate Fighter winner at 170. At 155, I’m always proving myself. I have nothing to prove to any of the fans, but to myself, it’s my skillset. I want to make sure I’m the s***, the man, the cheese, the heavy D, the guy who’s the man at 155 pounds when I’m there. I’m not leaving. It’s not going to be like the belt is going to flop around one or two fights. The belt hasn’t been held for three fights in a row or something like that, so when I get there, I want it to be the hardest fight that you could ever have, or the man who’s supposed to be the fight’s fight.

“If RDA is that fight, then this is considered a title fight. I’m looking at this as a title fight, so he better. I’m not going to rob Khabib of an ass-whooping either, so if he has the belt or Eddie Alvarez, it doesn’t matter, man. These are three great fighters. I’m blessed to be able to be here in this position and I’m not going to waste it. I think this is a great opportunity for the fans to see a little bit more of my skills, and that’s it.”.

“There’s already blueprints, man. You put the pressure on this guy. You test his conditioning. You test the cardio. You test the heart, the will. That’s how you beat RDA. Anything else, you want to try to knock him out, you try to set your focus on one little thing, it ain’t going to happen. It’s going to take precision and good power that’s going to put away this guy, and I have both.”

Tony Ferguson fights Rafael dos Anjos at UFC Fight Night 98 AKA UFC Fight Night: Dos Anjos vs. Ferguson AKA The Ultimate Fighter Latin America 3 Finale: dos Anjos vs. Ferguson on November 5 in Mexico City, Mexico.