Darren Till has found a new home in the UFC’s middleweight division and is on the cusp of a potential title shot against the champion, Israel Adesanya if he’s able to get past Derek Brunson in his upcoming fight. But, Till isn’t completely ruling out the possibility of moving back down to 170 pounds sometime in the future to challenge the welterweight champion, Kamaru Usman.
Before his tenure at middleweight, Till began his run to stardom as a welterweight, and at one point challenging for the belt against Tyron Woodley at UFC 228. Till would go on to lose to Jorge Masvidal before moving up to middleweight, defeating Kelvin Gastelum and falling to former champion Robert Whittaker.
Till is scheduled to fight Brunson on Sept. 4 in a UFC Fight Night main event, with the winner potentially getting a title shot for their next outing. In a recent interview with ESPN, Till talked about the idea of potentially moving back down to welterweight for another shot at the 170-pound title.
“I could probably still make welterweight,” Till said. “I know Kamaru Usman wants to fight me, I know he’s said that. He said ‘I still want to fight Till’, and we’ve got a little bit of history.”
“Leon [Edwards] gonna take that title, but why can’t I go down for one last hurrah and see if I can’t grab that strap I was meant to have.”
Two of Till’s biggest wins have come at welterweight, with back-to-back dominant performances against Stephen Thompson and Donald Cerrone en route to the title shot against Woodley. He looked visibly depleted on the scales leading up to his welterweight bouts, but Till sounds confident he can make at least one more attempt at the welterweight title.
First things first as he faces a very tough middleweight veteran in Brunson, who also wants another fight with Adesanya. If he’s able to get on another run as earlier on his career, he could potentially challenge for titles in two divisions once again.
Do you think Darren Till could defeat Kamaru Usman in a welterweight title bout?