Colby Covington is very familiar with both Kamaru Usman and Jorge Masvidal.
With the UFC’s plan of booking Usman to defend his welterweight championship against Masvidal in July at International Fight Week, Covington has weighed in on how he sees the potential matchup playing out.
A longtime training partner with Masvidal, Covington spent years with his former best friend turned rival. Covington also spent 24 minutes of battle with Usman at UFC 245, falling short in a tightly contested affair last December.
“If they fight, I think that ‘Marty Fakenewsman’ exposes journeyman Jorge Masvidal,” Covington told MMA Junkie. “Like I said before, ‘Street Judas’ Masvidal, he hit lightning in a bottle. He’s not that good of a fighter. He’s got three fights in a row where he got three lucky knockout finishes, but who’s he beat? Besides, he’s got 15 losses on his record – 15 losses. Why are we talking about him as a world-class fighter when he’s got 15 (expletive) losses on his record?
“So, (the UFC needs) to make this right, and they need to give me a title shot, and they need to run it back.”
Covington is willing to wait for the winner of Usman (16-1 MMA, 11-0 UFC) vs. Masvidal (35-13 MMA, 12-6 UFC) if the UFC does decide to go that route, and while there’s a risk of losing out on the Usman rematch, Covington sees the potential matchup as a win-win situation.
“It would suck, but it would also be good,” Covington said. “There’s really nothing bad that can come out of that fight. Whoever wins that fight, it’s going to be a massive fight. It’s either going to be my ex-best friend journeyman Jorge Masvidal, aka ‘Street Judas’ because he’s a turner, he’s a piece of (expletive) traitor, and if we fight, there’s such a history, man. We used to be best friends, we lived together for what, a year-and-a-half and trained together for eight years, every single day.
“Me and Jorge used to fight in apartments for two hours straight, fight in bathrooms, fight in parking lots, like to fight for a lot of money on the line. It would be easy to do, and it’s a real rivalry now. This is a heated rivalry. We want to kill each other, and there’s only one guy that’s going to get killed, and that’s him because he has no chance against me, but we’ll just have to see.”
Already back in the gym at American Top Team, Covington plans on staying ready in case the fight between Usman and Masvidal doesn’t come to fruition.
He has a feeling that Masvidal will likely price himself out.
“To be honest, I think he’s (Masvidal) going to sit out and wait for Conor McGregor, and he’s going to overvalue himself thinking he deserves more than he does, and I’m going to slide back, and I’m going to get my rematch this summer in July on International Fight Week,” Covington said.
Colby Covington sees Kamaru Usman exposing 'journeyman' Jorge Masvidal if they fight
