Nigerian Nightmare: Colby Covington turned me down 4X

Kamaru Usman will weigh in for UFC 228 on September 8, when UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley defends his belt vs. Darren Till. Should either fighter not be ready for any reason, Usman will be.

Prominently missing from the picture is interim division champ Colby Covington, who will lose his title when the Woodley vs. Till fight ends. Covington wanted more time before unifying the belts, so got steamrolled. During a recent appearance on Luke Thomas’s The MMA Hour, Usman was not impressed with Covington.

If I do fight anybody, besides winning the title on Sept. 8, it will be RDA. That’s really the only fight that makes sense. He just fought for an interim title, that’s the fight that puts me right there, said Usman, as transcribed by Peter Carroll for MMA Fighting.

I’m not getting Till, which I wanted. Covington, four times I’ve been offered that fight. He’s declined each and every one — I’m not getting that fight. The only guy left to put me right there is RDA.

Four times I’ve been offered that fight and he said no. They tried to make that fight again for Nov. 30th. They offered me the fight and I said, ‘Absolutely, I will wait for that fight’. They actually offered me RDA for that main event in Brazil that Glover and Jimi Manuwa just got announced on*. I said, ‘Yes, I’m ready, I’ll take the fight’, but he said he was dealing with something…he turned it down or he wasn’t ready to fight, Usman said.

If they had have offered me Covington on Nov. 30th, I would’ve said, ‘Absolutely’. That’s the one guy that I really have malicious intent to hurt inside that cage. Of course, they did offer me that and I did jump on that, but then [Covington] went to the White House and came back and was like, ‘I don’t want that fight’.

[Covington] talked for a long time about how he wanted a title fight. But then they give him a title fight — Sept. 8 that’s your event — but he comes out and says he’s not ready. You’re not the champ, you’re the interim guy. You’re just a placeholder. The champ is ready to go. He gave you an opportunity and you turned it down, so they went with the next guy, they went with Darren Till.

Now you have to sit and wait. God forbid, if something happens to the guys that have to fight on Sept. 8 and they have to be out for a while. What does that mean? You’re not going to fight forever until they’re ready? You said you’d be ready in November, [the UFC] offered me the fight in November. I accepted and he says no — once again for the fourth time.

*Teixeira just pulled out of the fight with an injury