Curtis Blaydes believes his UFC Beijing opponent Francis Ngannou looked “hesitant” in his last fight against Derrick Lewis because he was worried about gassing out.
Curtis Blaydes will seek redemption against Francis Ngannou in a long-awaited rematch at UFC Fight Night 141 on Nov. 24 in Beijing, China. The pair of heavyweights threw down for the first time in 2016. At the time, both were rising prospects brand new to the UFC. Now, they’re both ranked inside the division’s top five as perennial contenders. Two-and-a-half years later, the circumstances are much different, and the stakes are much higher.
Ngannou, however, has not had a good 2018. He fought then-heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic for the title in January, losing via dominant decision. Then, in July, he fell to Derrick Lewis in one of the worst fights in recent memory.
On the flip side, Blaydes is at the highest point of his still-young MMA career, coming off a third-round TKO win over Alistair Overeem this past June. “Razor” has not lost since his doctor’s stoppage defeat to Ngannou more than two years ago.
Blaydes believes Ngannou looked “very unsure of himself” against Lewis. He thinks the heavyweight knockout artist had his gas tank on his mind throughout the affair, and that Ngannou was worried about tiring.
“He looked like he didn’t wanna expend too much energy because he was too worried about having cardio issues like he did his last fight,” Blaydes told Submission Radio. “I think that was the biggest thing that was in his head. He didn’t want to gas out again. But you can’t go into a fight with that mindset. You gotta believe in your training and your conditioning and just go out there and execute the game plan. But he didn’t. He just didn’t look like his usual aggressive self.”
Ngannou scored nothing but knockout wins in the UFC until he met Miocic earlier this year — he picked up impressive wins over Alistair Overeem, former UFC champ Andrei Arlovski, among others. But once faced with adversity, Ngannou seemingly nosedived, according to Blaydes.
“He never had to rely on anything else. He got away with being a one-punch KO artist,” Blaydes said. “Which, hey, it did work for him, got him a lot of money. So, you can’t really blame him. But if you want to be around for a while you gotta always be adding tools into your tool belt, and I think he neglected that. And I think yeah, it’s come back to bite him in the ass.”
Blaydes expected to receive a title shot after beating Overeem two months ago, but immediately after Daniel Cormier won the heavyweight belt at UFC 226, plans changed for the worse for Blaydes. Former champ and current WWE star Brock Lesnar entered the cage and confronted Cormier, setting up the next heavyweight title fight. Lesnar, of course, hasn’t fought since a July 2016 no-contest against Mark Hunt (he initially won by decision, but the bout was overturned due to a Lesnar positive drug test). Prior to that, his last MMA fight was a TKO loss to Overeem in late 2011.
Because he got passed over for a title shot last month, Blaydes isn’t keeping his expectations too high even should he get past Ngannou in November.
“This is the UFC, so you never know,” he said. “I may have to fight one more time, I may have to fight two more times. Who knows? I used to think about that — my trajectory and who’s next and what’s next. But all it does is you end up feeling disappointed and disrespected when it doesn’t happen. And I don’t wanna be walking around feeling like I’m disrespected. So, I don’t have any expectations for after this fight besides winning. I don’t have any expectations for what’s next.”
Now that he’s realized MMA is closer to entertainment than sport in the sense that marketability matters, Blaydes plans to be more open moving forward about what he wants.
“I was trying to be like Mr. Chill, Mr. it doesn’t bother me, it’s OK,” Blaydes said. “I’m gonna voice my opinions. If I feel disrespected or I feel like I deserve something, anything, I’m gonna speak out. Everyone else is doing it and there’s no punishment, so why not.”