No. 5 Curtis Blaydes Unbothered Fighting Unranked Russian
Yesterday at 09:15 PM
Another unranked Russian is fighting a Top 5 Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) fighter next year.
When the news broke last week that former Heavyweight interim title challenger Curtis Blaydes would fight unranked UFC rookie Rizvan Kuniev at UFC Seattle in February 2025, the mixed martial arts (MMA) world scratched its heads.
It's not like it hasn't happened before, though. In 2023, one-fight UFC veteran Abus Magomedov headlined a UFC Fight Night against No. 7 ranked Sean Strickland(watch highlights), and just last year, unranked Shamil Gaziev collided with No. 8seededJairzinho Rozenstruik.
Both Russians got finished by the UFC veterans.
History repeats itself, but even more absurdly, because Blaydes is coming off a title fight with Tom Aspinall and Kuniev is making his UFC debut against him, red flags were again raised.
However, no one should be bothered by the random fight because "Razor Blades" doesn't care.
"[UFC] reached out to me with a name, and I was like, 'I like the date,' so I said yeah," Blaydes told James Lynch. "People don't understand that the money is the same regardless of the opponent, so I'll take a paycheck...All I know is he's Russian. I've had experience fighting Russians, they're not easy to put away, so I'm expecting a typical Heavyweight fight. He'll be swinging to get me out of there as early as he can, and I'll be doing my job by not letting him do that."
The No. 5 ranked Heavyweight could have waited for someone in the rankings, but it wouldn't have been until later in Q1 or Q2.
"They kind of gave me the option, and I could have just waited, but it would have been a long wait, like all the way until April or May," Blaydes said. "So I just figured they got me an opponent, I liked the date, and it's hard to turn down a paycheck."
Blaydes will look to rebound from his knockout loss to Aspinall, while Kuniev will look to get his first UFC win since starching his opponent on Contender Series in August.
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