Photo by Stephen Maturen/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC
“So, they have offered me Colby and I once again have accepted again and we will see what happens.”
Tyron Woodley says the UFC was quick to offer him a rebound fight against Colby Covington following his lopsided decision loss to Gilbert Burns at UFC on ESPN 9.
‘T-Wood’ claims the UFC offered him the Covington fight in the immediate aftermath of the Burns loss and that he didn’t hesitate to accept the matchup.
“They offered me that fight, I told them I’m in,” Woodley told ESPN’s Ariel Helwani in a recent interview (h/t Jed Meshew of MMA Fighting). “I mean, I just don’t want to talk a lot about Colby because Colby is an actor, man. I know what he is doing and it makes sense and it’s kind of fun to watch but, at the end of the day, Colby has turned me down five or six times. But I think after losing two fights back-to-back I think it may be a time he may accept it because he may think I’m down and out.”
Woodley went on to compare the Covington fight to the current ‘race war’ in America and said he is willing to fight ‘Chaos’ as soon as he’s healed up from the Burns loss.
“That was the first thing they did,” Woodley said. “They wanted to see if I was alright then they offered me the fight against Colby. I told Malki (Kawa) to make sure you tell them today, yes. Don’t wait until tomorrow, tell them today yes. I got a contusion I’ve got to deal and I can’t fight anyway for 45 to 60 days because of the cut. I’ve been icing six, seven times a day, icing, ibuprofen, so I’ve been doing the right stuff. Fighting Colby right now is like fighting this race war. This brutality and just the unsettling climate of our culture. I’m just going to take it as that. So, they have offered me Colby and I once again have accepted again and we will see what happens.”
Woodley, the former UFC welterweight weight champion, is currently ranked #4 in the UFC welterweight fighter rankings and has been removed from the UFC’s top-fifteen pound-for-pound list.