Muhammed Lawal looks to be focusing on a permanent move to the UFC in the future.
Following his knockout victory over Roger Gracie this past weekend, Lawal said he hopes to test his skills against the UFC’s top competitors in the near future. The UFC has recently acquired some of Strikeforce’s prominent stars, including Alistair Overeem, Nick Diaz and, most recently, Cung Le.
“I want to go where everybody’s going to and it seems everybody is going to the UFC,” Lawal told reporters following the Strikeforce event.
The former Strikeforce light heavyweight champion improved his record to 8-1 following his win over Gracie. This was Lawal’s first bout since last August after he suffered a knee injury which forced him to miss the remainder of 2010.
The win over Gracie would put Lawal in a good position to reclaim the light heavyweight title, but he would rather turn his attention to the UFC, where he is open to the idea of a UFC vs. Strikeforce event before an eventual merger.
“Maybe, hopefully, they’d have a UFC vs.Strikeforce event,” he said, “…and then make it all just be UFC, how about that?”
The idea of seeing Strikeforce’s top competitors face UFC’s top competitors would be an interesting event, to say the least. Should the idea ever come to fruition, a light heavyweight bout between Lawal and Quinton “Rampage” Jackson would certainly sell. Both fighters are known to have a history with each other and Lawal has requested a bout with Jackson on a few occasions in the past.
Whether a future matchup would materialize between the two rivals remains to be seen.
Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com