Curtis Blaydes does not think Alex Pereira should move up to heavyweight.
At UFC 303, Pereira successfully defended his light heavyweight title with a second round knockout of Jiri Prochazka. After the win, talk quickly turned of Pereira possibly moving up to heavyweight to become the first three division champion in UFC history. But Curtis Blaydes believes he should reconsider.
“Bad idea,” Blaydes told reporters at UFC 304 media day. “Him, I’ll give you my premeditated plan: I’m going to shoot. Immediately. Why would I give him any chance to knock me out on the feet when I know I can take him down at will? I’m sure he has to know that. I think he’s looking for a specific heavyweight, not any heavyweight.
“He has matchups against — I can see him beating guys like Tai. We watched him sparring Tai Tuivasa. Maybe some other guys in the bottom of the top-15. But you give him a top-five guy with some real weight, he’s not winning.”
Pereira recently released training footage with Tai Tuivasa which only stoked the flames for a possible heavyweight move. But Pereira is a former middleweight and as Blaydes notes, he’s fought some of the hardest hitting heavyweights of all time, meaning he’s supremely confident “Poatan” wouldn’t even have a puncher’s chance against him.
“I’m going to eat that knee,” Blaydes said when asked about Pereira’s flying knees. “I ate one from Alistair [Overeem]. You think he throws harder knees than Alistair? I know he’s got the aura going on right now, but I ate a knee from 265 pound Alistair. I’m good with eating knees.
“Yes [I would welcome a fight]. Yes. I know that’s what everyone wants. I would f*ck up Alex Pereira. It’s not because he’s not good. I’m heavier than he is. A heavyweight, gravity, weight matters. It’s not a skill basis. It’s just how it is.”
For now, such a matchup is purely hypothetical and Blaydes has his own fight to worry about as “Razor” takes on interim heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall in the co-main event of UFC 304 this Saturday in Manchester, England.
