Colby Covington isn’t sold on Khamzat Chimaev and is confident he would put an end to his hype if they were matched up.
Chimaev (10-0 MMA, 4-0 UFC) has torn through competition since storming onto the UFC roster in 2020. The 27-year-old continued to make it look easy when he drew his toughest test to date, needing just one round to dominate and submit Li Jingliang at UFC 267.
But Covington currently has his sights set on former best friend-turned rival Jorge Masvidal and doesn’t think Chimaev is even worthy of facing him.
“Guys, I don’t think they can sanction that fight legally yet,” Covington told Submission Radio. “I think that there’s such a discrepancy in the rankings. I mean, the guy hasn’t even beat anybody in the top 10 yet. I mean, I’ve been in the top 10 for five years now, beating champion after champion. So, I don’t even know if a commission would allow this fight to go through. But this fight, the only way it would look would just be complete domination. Colby Covington Incorporated just going out there and ending all that hype.
“That same type of hype that all the clickbait journalists, all the MMA media out there put on Street Judas Masvidal. That same hype. They hype (Chimaev) up, they can’t stop talking about him, and everything’s about this kid, this hype, this hype, and then boom, it gets halted. So, it would get halted in a very violent way. And you don’t want to hurt a kid’s career before he even gets started. So, you send him up here, he’s never going to be the same person again.”
Chimaev, who overcame a serious case of COVID-19 to return to the cage this year, has called out Covington on numerous occasions, but the former two-time title challenger thinks it’s all just a front.
“Talk is cheap,” Covington said. “Everyone is running their mouth these days, but I don’t see anybody actually doing something about it. He can say all these things and try and hype himself up and build himself up, but this is the same kid that was ready to retire, ready to quit and call it off the common cold – the common cold.”
He continued, “This kid was ready to give it up, he was crying, he was retired, he was done. Off the common cold. So, I don’t make much of what the guy said.”
Colby Covington: Khamzat Chimaev’s hype would be ‘halted in a very violent way’ if we fought
