The life of a fighter changes constantly. You can be scheduled for a fight with one fighter one day, then the next it can be someone different due to injury or other circumstances. Ricardo Lamas, though, went from having no fight to being offered a set of fights.
The UFC featherweight had come off a win over the highly ranked Hatsu Hioki in June at UFC on FX 4. He was just waiting on getting his next fight. About two weeks ago, Lamas got a phone call for a fight against a former world champion.
“They [the UFC] offered me a fight with Frankie Edgar in December and we accepted it,” Lamas told Bleacher Report. “We were just waiting to hear back from UFC matchmaker Sean Shelby as we didn’t know if they had talked to Frankie yet or not. We accepted the fight on our side and we were just awaiting confirmation.”
Things then got more interesting. The UFC announced on Thursday that Erik Koch had to bow out of his fight with UFC Featherweight Champion Jose Aldo at UFC 153 with an undisclosed injury and Edgar would be stepping in to face Aldo. Before that announcement was made, it was Lamas who was going to face Aldo.
“They [UFC] had called me first on Thursday,” Lamas stated. “They had called me up at about 3:30 p.m. Central time and said, ‘Obviously Koch is injured and we need to know tonight if you want to take this fight with Aldo? We think you deserve it and we need to redo your contract. We need to get it all done by tonight.'”
‘We said ‘Yes, yes, yes,'” Lamas stated. “We got my contract figured out and was just waiting on a bout agreement. Then they [the UFC] called at 9 p.m. Central and said they decided to in a different direction with the fight and that’s when they decided to go with Frankie.”
Lamas, hoping to fight by the end of the year, is naturally disappointed with not getting a fight with either Edgar or Aldo. He is grateful that his employer thinks highly enough of him to consider him to fight two high-profile fighters.
“I was disappointed,” Lamas stated. “I was really excited. That’s an opportunity guys wait their entire career for. The opportunity came of out nowhere. I wasn’t promised for months to fight Aldo. It came about last second. I can also see where the UFC thinks that it is going to be a better fight with Frankie Edgar. He [Edgar] is a former world champion and he’s more well known than I am. I appreciate that the UFC offered me the fights. It means they hold me in high regard and have me in mind.”
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