UFC veteran opens up on the Khabib Nurmagomedov fight that never happened
Khabib Nurmagomedov took on some of the best lightweights of his era, but there was one key fighter he never fought. Appearing on Bowks Talking Bouts, Gilbert Melendez reflected on his incredible competitive career while focusing on his newer role as a promoter with Fight Night: San Jose 3 set to transpire on May 17.
During Melendez's tenure, he was slated to fight Nurmagomedov at UFC 170, but the bout was cancelled. The former was next booked into his sophomore UFC lightweight title shot at UFC 181 vs. Anthony Pettis.
When expounding upon how he would have been interested in fighting 'The Eagle' at that time, Melendez said:
"I think Khabib is a great fighter. I think the best of the best to be greatest of all time, you need to hang around the sport a lot more to prove that. What I mean by that is, you know, I'll just go back to the Russian wrestler Aleksandr Karelin who is a three time gold medalist, one time silver medalist. He was the best in the world."
He added:
"Wow, you're great but then four years later, there's a whole new batch of young bucks who are waiting to come get you. Karelin took them out again. Four years later there's a new group of bucks that come out and he took them all again, right. So I believe Khabib is great. I think he is a great champion but I do believe that he left some on the mats."
Check out Gilbert Melendez's reflections on cancelled Khabib Nurmagomedov contest below [33:10]:
Gilbert Melendez assesses how fight with Khabib Nurmagomedov would have played out
Khabib Nurmagomedov taking on Gilbert Melendez would have likely been an incredible contest, and Melendez recently broke down the machinations of that matchup if it were to happen.
When describing how unfortunate it was that we never saw 'The Eagle' in there at the right time with fighters like Tony Ferguson and Kevin Lee, Melendez said:
"These are just guys who are tough matchups for him and that's what I believe I was for him, right. No one can really hold me down. I know how to get off of bottom."
He added:
"I would have been really interested to see how I could do against him on the bottom because no one can hold me down. Maybe Jake Shields but no one can hold me down. At that moment, I was pretty piqued up and I was excited for that fight."