Undefeated UFC Heavyweight Mick Parkin would relish the opportunity to perform once again in front of a UK crowd following his unanimous decision victory against Mohammad Usman at UFC Vegas 89.
The Brit moved to 9-0 as he continued his impressive run with the UFC since signing with the promotion on the back of a first round submission victory on the 2022 season of Dana White’s Contender Series.
In his bout with Usman on Saturday night, Parkin started slow and paid for it, eating a big shot in the first round. He managed to recover relatively quickly from the impactful strike and credited his constant development as an athlete and valuable time inside the cage as the reason he was able to recover in the time he did. In his post fight interview he said:
“It's just experience. I remember getting hit hard in the last fight and thinking ‘Oh, this is not good.’
“But now I've been there, done that. Just keep your composure. Move. I think I hit him with a big right hand, I think , and that maybe stung him a bit and then he stepped off. Then I recovered pretty quick and then it was like ‘Right, get back on the game plan, move your feet, kick his leg.’ And then I felt fine from that big shot but I knew we definitely won the round with the big shots.”
Heading into the third round, it was largely perceived that it was still all to play for, with the athletes likely having one round each. Parkin disclosed the advice his vastly experienced corner, made up of UK MMA veteran Andrew Fisher and KSW Heavyweight champion Phil De Fries, offered to ensure he had his hand raised at the end of the final five minutes.
“He (Fisher) said the first one was tight, he (Usman) definitely probably won it with the big shots landing. Second was ours he thought so just push the pace, hands high and walk him down. The game plan was to try and get him to wrestle me, I know he is quite a heavy wrestler but he fades off, his explosion goes when he's wrestled heavy and usually falls back onto wrestling to win the rounds, he didn't do that but I felt like I got him with some big shots enough to make them step back. Hurting him to the legs, swaying the judges.
“He hit me with that big shot, he should have never hit me with something like that. Woke me up a little bit and once I started moving my feet, he was never going hit me again.”
There is a lot of speculation that the UFC will return to UK soil later this year, with a card in Manchester being highly touted as destination for the fight night. Parkin would love the chance to fight in front of a home crowd for the first time since his UFC debut. The 28-year-old is currently one of a cohort of British heavyweights training regularly with the interim UFC Heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall. The Sunderland native sees the chance of being able to train with Aspinall as invaluable and would love to see the interim champion headline the proposed UK card, although he is unsure who his stablemate could face.
“It's amazing to go and train with Tom, like he still Tom to me. It's like I told myself the other day. I was like, ‘Oh, I'm training with the world champion, the best Heavyweight in the world. I can't get better training than that anywhere.' He is great, is a great guy. I do feel a bit bad for him now because I feel like that the main fights are just sort of missing him.
“I don't know who else he'll get. I don't feel like anyone's eager to fight him. The Jones fight would be awesome for him but I just can't see it happening at the moment. I feel like Jones wants to fight Stipe, they want to fight each other, a lot of money and they are probably going to be finished after that.
“So I understand why they are doing it, it's just a bit bad for Tom, but I'd love to get in the July card and hopefully Tom could headline it. That would be amazing.”
As for himself, Parkin is happy to face anyone the UFC put in front of him, having been happy with their matchmaking so far.
“I don't even think about stuff like that. I just say the card. The UFC have been great matching me so I'll have anybody. I feel like once you get the top 15, that's when you start calling people out. I think now, I don't care, literally anybody.”
