Colby Covington is in a difficult position right now in the welterweight division where he is a former three-time title challenger.
Having previously held the interim title at 170-pounds, "Chaos" is seemingly eyeing up a move away from the division that he has called home for a long time.
He spoke in a recent interview with Submission Radio about how a fight against Sean Strickland up at middleweight would be interesting to him.
Strickland is set to challenge for the middleweight title at UFC 312 in a rematch with Dricus Du Plessis but Covington hasn't been impressed by the former champ:
“The Sean Strickland fight is always interesting,” Covington said. “He’s had his his things to say about me in the past. I don’t think he’s anything special. He’s got a jab, he’s got a front kick, but besides that you shut those those weapons down and he’s very limited. He’s a cardio fighter. He’s just a cardio kickboxer, essentially. I don’t see any threats out of Sean Strickland and it’s an entertaining fight that I might entertain in the future. We’ll see.”
Strickland isn't the only reason that Covington is playing with the idea of moving up a weight class in order to join the 185-pound ranks.
He went into more detail about what a move to middleweight looks like for him and why it interests him in the first place.
“Honestly, ‘85 is intriguing,” Covington said. “I think it would be kind of cool to go up there with the narrative like, ‘Oh, this guy’s a small ‘70. He’s going to go up to ‘85 and take on an even bigger challenge.’ So there is a possibility. I’m always looking for the biggest and best fights, so we’ll see. I’m not sure, we’ll see what’s on the table, who’s hot at the time. I’m just always looking for the biggest and best fights. So it doesn’t matter. Any weight class.”
“I know those guys are a lot slower,” Covington added. “That’s why guys that leave welterweight and they go to middleweight have so much success. Those guys like Whittaker, who became champion, a guy like Sean Strickland, who became a champion. They leave this welterweight where these guys are fast, they have good cardio. These are the best athletes on the planet in this weight class. So they go up and they have so much success at middleweight because the middleweights are unathletic. They’re slow. So there is something to be said with that, what type of training you would do. I definitely want to put on some muscle, but I also want to be efficient with the speed and making sure I’m really quick twitch, ready to pounce on these guys.”
Watch the full interview below:
