Brett Johns
Wants to fight: [autotag]Urijah Faber[/autotag]
The callout: “I’m happy to fight anybody in this weight division. It is the ‘anyone can get it’ tour. If you ask me a name, I’d like to fight a legend, a legend of the game. I’d like to fight someone like Urijah Faber, a guy who has been there and done it and fought the best guys.
“Was that the performance to really shout and scream about it? Probably not, but if Urijah is watching, that’s a fight I dream to have. I think about getting my shorts framed after the fight and imagine fighting Urijah Faber and them shorts, that would be a dream come true.”
The reality: Welsh bantamweight [autotag]Brett Johns[/autotag] arrived in the UFC as a Cage Warriors champion and has found his feet on the big stage. Now he says the time is right for him to take on another big name.
Johns’ only two defeats have come against contenders Aljamain Sterling and Pedro Munhoz, and he took both men the distance in competitive outings. But he’s improving with each fight, and sees a fight with Faber as the chance to score a marquee win against one of the biggest names in the bantamweight division. From Johns’ perspective, it certainly makes a load of sense. But I’m not sure how Faber is treating his career at this point.
“The California Kid” certainly isn’t a man to shy away from a challenge, but after his knockout loss to Petr Yan at UFC 245 last December, it remains to be seen how he’ll handle his career from here on out. Will he slot back into the 135 mix and look to work his way back into a ranked position, or is he now exclusively looking at big-name fights at this point?
If it’s the former, a matchup with Johns would certainly make for an interesting booking. However, I suspect it’s more likely to be the latter, and the prospect of Faber pursuing a fourth fight with old rival Dominick Cruz might not be out of the question in the coming months.
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