UFC 279 headliner Khamzat Chimaev and Paulo Costa shared a heated moment at the UFC Performance Institute.
The Chechen phenom known as ‘Borz’ (11-0 MMA, 5-0 UFC) headlines UFC 279 against Nate Diaz (20-13 MMA, 15-11 UFC) Saturday. Chimaev confronted middleweight Paulo Costa ahead of his UFC279 matchup. Costa was training with Nate Diaz’s ‘Skrap Pack’ teammate Jake Shields when ‘Borz’ started cussing at Costa.
“I was there this morning working out with Paulo Costa, going over some techniques and just drilling, and all of a sudden Khamzat starts yelling at us and cussing Paulo like, ‘Well, you want to fight?'” Shields said. “We look over, and it’s him and like ten dudes.”
“So Paulo jumps up and starts talking sh*t. I run over to back up Paulo because I don’t know if they’re trying to jump him, right? There were a couple of guys, so I wasn’t sure if they were going to jump him. There were a couple of guys that we didn’t recognize.”
“So we run over and start talking sh*t, and Khamzat keeps going, ‘Let’s fight now, let’s fight now,’ but as he’s saying that, he’s walking down the stairs. It seemed like it was kind of more of an act for the cameras than anything. I guess someone said afterward that he was scoping us out for 10 minutes. If he wanted to fight Paulo, he would’ve run in there and started swinging on him, not stood outside the cage and say, ‘Let’s fight right now. Let’s fight right now.'”
Costa Claims Khamzat Chimaev Was Scared
The two minced words and Chimaev had to be restrained by teammates. Costa posted his reaction to his YouTube channel after the altercation, where he accused Chimaev of being scared.
“I met Chimaev there, and man, he was scared,” Costa said. “The guy stood there, and he froze. He froze. I actually was not surprised. As I said before, cupcake Chechen, gourmet Chechen is a bully with small guys.”
“He called me to talk, and I went there; I faced him. He said, ‘Hey Borrachinha, why do you talk about me?’ I said, ‘Man, what did I talk about you? You want to fight me?’ He said, ‘No, no – I want to know what you talk about me.’ I said, ‘Man, I want to fight you. If you beat Nate Diaz, I want to fight you,’ and he froze. He said, ‘OK, so let’s fight now.’ His whole team got in the middle between me and him. Man, this guy is scared. He’s scared as f*ck.”
“Just so you know, Chimaev, I don’t need to have a couple of guys with me. I’m an army of one man. I walk alone, and I can beat you alone with just one hand.”
You can see the entire interaction below:
With one fight left on Costa’s contract, he seemingly wants ‘Borz’ next. How do you think a fight goes between the middleweight title contender and Chimaev? Let us know in the comments below!
Featured image credits to Embed from Getty Images and Embed from Getty Images
