Luke Rockhold is willing to accept a fight with Paulo Costa if he misses weight – but only by a certain limit.
After a three-year layoff, Rockhold (16-5 MMA, 6-4 UFC) will return to his original division of middleweight when he faces Costa (13-2 MMA, 5-2 UFC) on July 30 at UFC 277.
Costa is coming off a unanimous decision loss to Marvin Vettori last October, a fight that was contested at light heavyweight after Costa struggled to make the 185-pound mark. Although UFC president Dana White stated that Costa needs to move up a weight class, the former title challenger has signed to fight Rockhold at middleweight.
“I like Paulo, I like this fight, I like this weight,” Rockhold told ESPN. “I want to fight him at ’85, yeah. I’ll give him five-pound allowance. If he can’t make 190, f*ck off and let’s move on. There better be a backup fighter or something ready to go because that’s kind of what I told the UFC. I’m not here to play games. I want to go out there, and I want to prove that I’m ready to do this thing at f*cking middleweight. Not at catchweight, not at light heavyweight.”
Rockhold, a former Strikeforce and UFC middleweight champion, is eager to return to form. Since losing his title to Michael Bisping in 2016, the 37-year-old has dropped two of his past three, including a failed stint at light heavyweight in his past outing against Jan Blachowicz in July 2019.
But the goal for Rockhold isn’t just to compete. He’s eyeing UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya, which is why he’s jumping straight back against the top of the division.
“I want to show that I can fight at 185 and be a challenger for the belt,” Rockhold said. “That’s the only reason I’m here. That’s the only reason I’m coming back is because I want to fight Israel, because I want to fight for the championship. I want to make a run at this thing and I know I can. I’ve pushed may body, I’ve tested my body, I got it. I still f*cking got it and it’s just having the presentness and that hunger and not getting distracted and having that weight of everything else that I’ve carried over the career.”
Luke Rockhold willing to give Paulo Costa five-pound allowance: ‘If he can’t make 190, f*ck off’