Kamaru Usman is looking to leave no doubt when it comes to who the best fighter of all-time is reports MMA Fighting writer Drake Riggs.
Fighting and winning is literally the key to carving out a lasting legacy in MMA, it’s just a matter of the fashion in which it’s done in along the way. Typically, the sport has seen champions like Georges St-Pierre, Anderson Silva, and Jon Jones establish themselves as some of the best ever by having long reigns within their divisions, taking out any and all comers.
At UFC 278 this Saturday night, the current welterweight champion Usman will aim to continue displaying his dominance with a sixth consecutive title defense and second win over Leon Edwards. After that, the “Nigerian Nightmare” wants to do something completely unheard of: jump over the middleweight division and claim light heavyweight gold.
“A lot of times nowadays, everyone’s throwing around this, ‘G.O.A.T., greatest of all time…’ That’s relative,” Usman told ESPN. “For me, what I want, and this is kind of why I got into the sport … I’m just a competitive guy. I got into sports and I just realized it was something burning inside me that I wanted to compete and compete. I wanted to best that guy. This is the ultimate, mono-e-mono, the sport to do it.
“With that being said with respect to that, I want to be respected. So, when I get in there and I bested everyone, I want you to show me that respect. So, if I bested everyone in my division then I said I will skip one and I just want to prove to you — everyone says pound-for-pound, but that’s just kind of a scenario. You just throw that out, ‘If they were the same weight class, could this guy best that guy?’ And I want to prove that. I want to be able to do that. No one’s ever done it. If I can do that, hey, you put whatever title you want to put on it but ultimately I want the respect.”
Usman and Edwards first went to battle in Dec. 2015, resulting in a unanimous decision victory for Usman and what is currently Edwards’ last loss. Despite the good gap of time since then along with a relatively one-sided showing for the now-champion, Usman admits to a specific moment lingering in his mind from part one of their series.
