Former UFC champion Kamaru Usman has seen a turn in form his recent UFC results and feels the fans have forgotten the man he was.
At 170lbs Usman is undoubtedly one of the sports greatest champions and was rapidly gaining on MMA Icon Georges St-Pierre. Before his infamous KO defeat to Leon Edwards out in Salt Lake City Usman had racked up five defences and was unbeaten in the UFC after 15 bouts. He was one of the sports most impressive and active champions he also sat at the very top of the pound for pound rankings.
Kamaru Usman Talks About His Title Reign
After three consecutive defeats many fans and fellow fighters seem to have forgotten whom The Nigerian Nightmare is and the talent the man has. On the Weighing In Podcast Usman spoke about his title reign and his attitude towards competition.
“For a long, long time there, I was entertaining and entertaining, and entertaining was the thing for me. I didn’t care what I was going through; I didn’t care what I was dealing with; I didn’t care what I was battling physically, mentally, emotionally. It didn’t matter to me. I was going to jump in there and perform and perform and perform. And the same thing with Israel Adesanya, which is why you saw a ton of those title defences. And, I’m sure, Alexander Volkanovski, who also came out and expressed that sometimes. We do these things to jump in and go and go and go, to try to entertain the masses. And of course we reap the benefits of that. We get the checks. It comes with that.”
Usman Speaks on Fan Disrespect
Rightly so, Usman deserves his flowers for his performances in the UFC octagon however his form currently is under par. His most recent bout against Khamzat Chimaev started horrendously in round one but improved over the following rounds. Admittedly on very short notice and up at 185bs it was unlikely we would see peak Usman but it was not a top performance. He followed up on the podcast talking about the current views of the MMA community around himself as a competitor.
“Now, I’m in a place where, OK, with all of that comes a lot of injuries, all the things that you’ve been dealing with. It kind of catches up to you. Now I’m just in a position to where I’m trying to heal all of that. Because, you know, you stack up all these injuries over time, and it starts to diminish your performances to where people start to forget just how good you are, just how much time you spent building your career, doing the things that made you successful, to where they start to (say), ‘Oh, he’s washed.’ Which is, how disrespectful are MMA fans? How disrespectful are they? ‘Oh, he’s washed. Oh, he can’t do this anymore. He’s not that.'”
Given the calibre of champion he was Kamaru Usman still has a potential route to UFC gold despite his recent losses. Current unpopular champion Belal Muhammed has offered either the former champion or rising star and number one contender Shavkat Rakhmonov a shot at the 170lb belt. Muhammed appears to be angling towards the former champion as he pokes fun at him online regularly, however at 18-0 Rakhmonov is undeniably for the next shot. It would be criminal if a former champion on a three fight skid got a shot before the marauding Kazakh.
Featured image credits to Embed from Getty Images
