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LAS VEGAS – [autotag]Tyron Woodley[/autotag] knows how things have looked recently. His last three fights have ended in losses, and he doesn’t care they were to top contenders.
In the midst of fight week, Woodley (19-6-1 MMA, 9-5-1 UFC) plans on the end result of his UFC 260 fight against [autotag]Vicente Luque[/autotag] to come down to a simple equation. If he performs to the best of his ability, he wins. If not, he’ll lose.
“You can really control your performance,” Woodley told MMA Junkie at a pre-fight news conference Wednesday. “I just know with me performing to the level I can perform, everything else is just going to pan itself out. I’m not going to have to worry about wins and losses. I’m not going to have to worry about bonuses and big fights.”
As simple as it sounds, not understanding that was an issue for Woodley in the past. Perceived by some as a fighter who often competed with a chip on his shoulder, Woodley enters his battle with Luque (19-7-1 MMA, 12-3 UFC) unconcerned about the public opinion.
“I think I was focused so heavily on proving people wrong so many times in my career that it took away from proving people right,” Woodley said. “I got 20 or 30 people I’ve got to prove right: coaches, loved-ones, kids, training partners, people who really supported me since the beginning. It’s millions of people you’ve got to try to prove wrong. For me, it’s just really focusing and really understanding that life is not a straight path. It can be, but we make choices. I made choices in my life that kind of veered me off that path.”
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Woodley, who turns 39 on April 7, has not won a fight since a September 2018 title defense against Darren Till. He’s competed three times since then, a skid that consists of two unanimous decision losses (to Kamaru Usman and Gilbert Burns) and a fifth-round TKO defeat due to injury (to Colby Covington). Despite his recent struggles, Woodley won’t consider retirement unless he’s on top.
“Quitting is not an option,” Woodley said. “I’ve got to go out on top like I plan to do in the way I saw myself at the beginning of the sport. That’s not the way. It wasn’t losing to these guys. Although they were the champion, one, and two. But on paper, I’m a better fighter than all of them.”
Though he admits his mind could’ve been in more productive places in past fights, Woodley thinks his physical preparation was never short of perfect. That makes losing a difficult problem to solve. At the end of the day, Woodley needs to perform. That’s it.
“I just see myself controlling the variables that I can control,” Woodley said. “I’ve trained. I’ve put my body through the fire. I’m ready to go. Just performing, performing. I don’t even know how I can say it any different way. I’m trying to draw some more fancier, $50 words for you but that’s all it really boils down to is performing. I do that against (Luque) and I just focus on who’s in front of me. Every fight is the biggest fight, and after that, it’s the next biggest fight and performance. If I can do that, I think I’ll be fine.
UFC 260 takes place Saturday at the UFC Apex. The main card airs on pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and early prelims on ESPN+.
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