When attention turns to Conor McGregor's next fight after last night's defeat to Khabib Nurmagomedov, Tony Ferguson is sure to held up as a possible - and very exciting - opponent.
Taking in part in what was deemed the Fight of the Night at UFC 229, Ferguson's defeat of Anthony Pettis has him feeling particularly confident about the prospect.
Reflecting on the main event, Ferguson was disheartened at the sight of "two knuckleheads over there making this sport look bad." Directing his ire toward the post-fight antics, Ferguson believes he is the man to clean up the sport.
On an 11-fight win streak, whatever of the interest in a potential Ferguson vs McGregor bout, the American fighter has his sights set on a different outcome.
Khabib and I deserve to fight. We need to fight for the fifth time, we need to try this out again. He is the champ, I was the interim champ. I’m still the fucking champ. There’s no BS in this.
In fact, Ferguson claims that Conor McGregor really doesn't want anything to do with him.
Conor does not want to fight me. I saw him when we were walking out to the weigh-ins. He walked up, he did his strut, I turned around and he fucking stopped. He looked like a deer in headlights.
Nobody wants to be trapped inside that cage with me. They don’t want to get killed by my elbows. They don’t want to get hit by any of my kicks and they don’t want to get their conditioning checked by me.
I’m a different animal than these guys. They want to be animals inside there, I’m a dogcatcher guys. I got a noose for them.
Contemplating the prospect of a Khabib vs McGregor rematch, Ferguson argued that the first bout all but confirmed that such an eventuality is not required; “Rematch? The dude got finished. Dude got straight up finished. If you got finished, you need to move the fuck on.”
