Welterweight veteran and coach, James Krause seems keen on a matchup with a fellow veteran for his next Octagon outing. Following a recent call out from The Ultimate Fighter 1 winner, Diego ‘The Nightmare’ Sanchez via an Instagram direct message, Krause has noted his willingness to battle the New Mexico native.
Giving his thoughts on Sanchez’s often questioned head coach, Joshua Fabia, Krause claimed that if the former wasn’t at all happy with his “opinion“, he’d have no qualms toward settling their differences inside the Octagon.
Sending a couple of messages to Krause from his official Instagram account recently, Sanchez took exception to Krause’s comments regarding Fabia, and after noting his intentions to call time on his career in April or May, the latter then detailed how he would fight Sanchez in the first-round, Fabia in a second-round, and in the third and final round, whoever else Sanchez brought in his “circus act“.
Speaking with MMA Fighting reporter Mike Heck on an episode of What The Heck podcast, Krause detailed his confusion regarding the timing of Sanchez’s callout, after claiming Fabia didn’t know “sh*t” about fighting.
“I don’t know him as a person, maybe he is a good guy,” Krause said about Fabia. “I don’t know him. I’ve never said a bad word… well, that’s not necessarily true. I feel like he’s a master manipulator. I did respond to Diego (Sanchez) and said, ‘I’m sure he’s a nice guy, he just doesn’t know sh*t about fighting.“
“I basically said I thought his coach was a joke and apparently he took offence to that,” Krause continued. “This was like six or eight months ago. Sh*t, I had forgotten all about it. It may have been even longer, but I just said I thought the dude was a master manipulator. think he’s a joke. I don’t know him personally but I don’t think he knows anything about combat sports period.“
If Sanchez has a problem with Krause’s above Instagram post, Krause has said all he has to do is meet him in the Octagon to settle their differences, however, the Lees Summit native maintains he hasn’t received any response.
“I was just giving my opinion and if you don’t like it, fight me,” Krause said. “I don’t know how else to say it. Apparently, he wants to fight me but I haven’t heard a response since I posted that (from him) or his guy.”
Riding a seven-fight unbeaten run at welterweight, Krause most recently featured at UFC Fight Island 6 in October, besting Claudio Silva on short-notice as he replaced Muslim Salikhov. At UFC 247 in February of last year, Krause drafted in on a single day’s notice to clash with Trevin Giles dropping a split decision in place of Antonio Arroyo.