UFC featherweight champion Alex Volkanovski reacts to Bellator champion Patricio Pitbull calling himself the best featherweight on the planet
Patricio 'Pitbull' Freire, the Bellator featherweight and lightweight champion, defended his featherweight title against Pedro Carvalho at the recently concluded Bellator 252 event.
'Pitbull' needed just over two minutes to knock-out Carvalho with a left-hook to a right-cross combo that floored him.
Speaking after the impressive win, Pitbull said:
I’m not the best featherweight in Bellator. I’m the best featherweight in the world. No other featherweight has my hands. I’m complete. Now, I have 11 knockouts and 11 submissions. There’s no other featherweight in the world that is as complete as I am.
Bellator CEO Scott Coker agreed with Pitbull's assessment in the post-fight press-conference:
We are lucky to have him. He’s been a great fighter for us. He’s been a great ambassador for us. He was here even way before me. I’ll tell you what, I looked back and I saw a lot of his old clips over the last week, just looking around on our YouTube channels and different places.
I said, ‘This guy reminds me of a young Roberto Duran’ if we had to put it in a boxing sense, right? He is a young Roberto Duran. He is not afraid of anybody. He’s going to bring it. I think he’s the best. Right now? He’s the best featherweight in the world.
It's safe to say UFC Featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski wasn't impressed by either Coker or Pitbull's assessment, as he took to Twitter to reply to their comments.
Alexander Volkanovski unimpressed by Patricio Pitbull's comments
Despite Pitbull's comments calling himself the best featherweight in the world, he's ranked 23rd in the world by Tapology. Pitbull has been on a great run since losing to Benson Henderson back in 2016.
During the run Pitbull beat Daniel Straus, Daniel Weichel, Emmanuel Sanchez, Michael Chandler, Juan Archuleta before beating Carvalho. Chandler, UFC's new signing, was the backup fighter at UFC 254 if either Khabib Nurmagomedov or Justin Gaethje fell out of the fight.
However, the Featherweight division in UFC is one of the deepest and most dangerous divisions in the sport. Volkanovski, on his way to the title, had to defeat contenders such as Jose Aldo and Chad Mendes - fighters who can be considered as all time greats in the division. He then defeated Max Holloway to win the title and defended it successfully against the Hawaiian again.