UFC lightweight Al Iaquinta is not willing to fight Khabib Nurmagomedov, unless it comes with a hefty price.
After another dominating performance at UFC 219, Khabib Nurmagomedov has made the rest of his division take notice. One of those who were greatly impressed was number ten-ranked contender Al Iaquinta.
“Ragin’ Al” was in awe of Khabib’s three-round beating of Edson Barboza, that he immediately shut down the possibility of being matched up against each other. But of course, he is willing to entertain the idea if it came with a hefty price.
“I can guarantee you [Conor McGregor] is not coming back to fight Khabib Nurmagomedov. Guaranteed. And I don’t blame him, I wouldn’t either,” Iaquinta told Ariel Helwani on Monday’s episode of The MMA Hour (transcript via MMA Mania). “You’d have to pay me $1 million dollars right now to fight that f—-ng guy. I don’t want to fight that f—-ng guy, did you see what happened to Barboza? Are you f—-ng nuts? You want to fight Khabib Nurmagomedov?” he added.
“You have to pay me to fight that guy. Now if you paid me I’d go in there and freaking fight him, but, Barboza got paid 70, whatever he got paid. Get the f–k out of here, that’s silly, you’re nuts. The guy is like, I don’t know.”
Iaquinta is currently scheduled to fight Paul Felder at UFC 223 on April 7th in Brooklyn.
The interview begins at the 2:12:22 mark of the video below.