Rafael dos Anjos thinks Darren Till is cutting too much weight to make 170 pounds.
Almost everyone has had something to say about Darren Till’s controversial weight cut at UFC Fight Night 130, and the latest fighter to chime in is former UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos, who is making final preparations for his interim welterweight title bout with Colby Covington at UFC 225.
In case you missed the drama surrounding Fight Night Liverpool, hometown hero Till missed weight by three and a half pounds and was forced to forfeit 30 percent of his purse to opponent Stephen Thompson. His Liverpool-based team also released footage of his grueling weight cut, where ‘The Gorilla’ ended up losing his vision towards the end of the video.
Till’s headlining bout with Thompson marked the second time the Liverpudlian has missed weight in the UFC, and ‘RDA’ thinks it’s only a matter of time until he moves up to middleweight.
“I don’t see him fighting very long in this welterweight division,” Dos Anjos told reporters at a recent media scrum (h/t Dan Hiergesell of MMA Mania). “Every time you make weight, it gets harder and harder and harder. I’ve been there before. I feel like every time I made 155, it was getting harder and harder every time. That’s gonna happen to him and he’s gonna go to 185 eventually.”
“He didn’t make weight, after all that. And we could not even watch the whole video, right? And he was 3-1/2 pounds over — off the extra pound. If he would fight for a title, it would be 4-1/2 pounds. He’s a great fighter, a young guy. But he’s going to go to 185 eventually.”
Till, who has bragged about being one of the biggest welterweight fighters on the roster, went on to beat Thompson in the main event, but many critics believe ‘Wonderboy’ was deserving of the decision.
Speaking of his own struggles to make weight, dos Anjos said he almost hit the back of his head on the bathtub while cutting weight for his lightweight title defence against Eddie Alvarez at UFC Fight Night 90, a fight the Brazilian lost via first-round TKO.
“I passed out three times and I went out and went back,” dos Anjos said. “I did that probably three times. One of the times, I was out for three minutes. I almost, when I fell back on the bathtub, I almost hit the back of my head on the sink. I could have died. And that was a fight that I shouldn’t fight. But everything happens for a reason. I did it and I lost and I learned a lot from it.”
After moving up to welterweight the following year, dos Anjos netted three straight wins over Tarec Saffiedine, Neil Magny, and Robbie Lawler. His interim title bout with Covington, at UFC 225, takes place next Saturday, June 9 at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois.