Former UFC middleweight champion Luke Rockhold is set to take on Paulo Costa at UFC 278. He hasn’t fought in three years, but told Helen Yee that a win in his first main event since his loss to Jan Blachowicz at UFC 239 will be enough to earn him a chance to recapture the 185-pound title.
“I’m not going to do anything else. If I don’t get it, they don’t get it.” It all depends, Rockhold says, on the outcome of UFC 281, which will see current champion Israel Adesanya defend his title against longtime rival Alex Pereira.
Luke Rockhold Believes He’s Only One Win Away From UFC Title
“It just depends on how Israel fights. If Israel tries to fight him… because he’s in his head. If he’s in his head and you let guys get in your head — he lost to him in a close one and then he got clipped in the second one because he let him get in his head.
He was in his head. You can see he was in his head. So if Israel lets him get in his head this time around, that’s interesting. Israel’s got to check himself and he’s got to fight MMA. We all know Alex Pereira sucks on the ground.
Even Israel could probably f****** put him away on the ground. This kid’s dangerous as hell on the feet, so it all depends on Israel, what his head space is and how he fights it.”
Before he gets a chance to face either Adesanya or Pereira, however, Rockhold needs to get through Paulo Costa. Costa, once a middleweight title contender, is enduring a serious career downswing. He lost to Israel Adesanya via knockout and then to Marvin Vettori, after failing to make weight, via decision. Another loss could end his UFC title hopes. Luke Rockhold isn’t worried about that: he’s focused on himself. “I’m not looking to do anything but just to be myself.
When I go outside myself you see what happens, I have s*** performances. When I’m relaxed and I have confidence in myself and I’m just happy and have fun, that’s when you see the Luke Rockhold that everyone really came to love in the first place. These last few years, four or five years, it’s not really been me, and you can see the shift.
So for me, just being myself, relaxing, finding my openings. I think this guy knows he’s got to come for me, and I’m going to hurt him every time he comes, and I’m going to put him down.”
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxDOqEV_KWA
