T.J. Dillashaw has told anyone who would listen that Demetrious Johnson never “manned up” for the champ vs champ superfight. A fight that almost the entire MMA world would LOVE to see.
However, according to Johnson, he did in fact agree to the fight, but was injured in training and the UFC lost interest, never circling back to the fight.
“I accepted the fight, I got injured, I had surgery, and they never offered it to me after I got injured. When they offered it to me I accepted, I got injured and got surgery, and then when it came time to fight again, from my understanding, from my management’s point of view, T.J. got offered to fight Cody (Garbrandt) with a brand new deal, so God bless him for getting a new deal to fight Cody. So the entire lead-up to this fight, even in July, I was never offered to fight T.J. Dillashaw. Before I got injured I was up for fighting him, then they moved on and went with Cody and T.J.”
While the UFC may have lost interest, Johnson is still open to the possibility of the two fighters meeting, but first, they both have to make it out of UFC 227 victorious. Oh… and the money has to be right.
“If the money’s right, I’ve always been up front about these super fights. Everyone keeps asking me. If the money’s not there and the compensation’s not there, then I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing. It’s obviously up to my management to make that happen. My management knows what I want, the UFC knows what I want and for me, I just show up and fight the No. 1 contender in the flyweight division and will continue to do that until something comes to my table that’s appetizing.”
Here’s hoping that both guys win this Saturday and the UFC finds a new interest in making this fight happen. It’s one that every real MMA fan would want to see.
Andy Gonzalez is a coach at Aces Jiu Jitsu Club. He has earned his BJJ Brown Belt under 2nd Degree Black Belt, Professor Mikal Abdullah. Follow Andy on Twitter at @GoGoGonzilla
Andy lives in Austin, Texas with his wife Amanda and their 3 beautiful children. Andy is also the father of a Marine who is honorably serving in the United States Marine Corps.