Cody Garbrandt wants a tournament against his fellow bantamweights to take place on UFC Fight Island, which will determine the new champion of the 135-pound class.
The 28-year old former champion returned to the win column on Saturday night, following a second-round buzzer beater knockout of Raphael Assuncao in the co-main event of UFC 250, which went down at the UFC Apex facility in Las Vegas.
Snapping a three-fight losing skid, Garbrandt scored his first win since December 2016, when he defeated Dominick Cruz to capture the bantamweight championship.
Arguably one of the best knockouts in the UFC this year, ‘No Love’ took home the Performance of the Night bonus, along with fellow 135-pounders, Aljamain Sterling and Sean O’Malley.
Eyeing to reclaim the bantamweight throne, Garbrandt suggested the upcoming UFC Fight Island should host a bantamweight tournament to crown a new champion.
#CodyGarbrandt not fighting someone on PEDs #UFC250 #UFC #MMA #MMATwitter pic.twitter.com/IrWbiu3AEW
— MMA Submission (@MMAsubPodcast) June 7, 2020
Old School
The bantamweight division has no champion at the moment, following Henry Cejudo’s retirement but Garbrandt said it is still the best division in the UFC, with plenty of ‘talented, strong, and fast’ killers.
“There’s gonna be so many potential bouts that I can have. So many potential knockout performance bonuses that I’m gonna get in my bank from all these guys. They come out and show up, I’m excited for the bantamweight division. It’s the best division in the UFC,” he said after the win.
“We have some killers. It’s a shark tank. You’ve got Dominick Cruz, you’ve got Urijah Faber still doing what he wants to do, you have so many guys. It’s a shark tank division.”
“Let’s do a bantamweight tournament, let’s get us in there. Let’s go to Fight Island for a few months, go get quarantined out there, bring our coaches, and let’s go to war.
“Let’s get this battle, get this tournament and see who the real champion is. Let’s go back to the old-school days.”
Cody Garbrandt has TNT in his hands. Raphael Assunção was out before he hit the canvas. #UFC250 pic.twitter.com/P4aRy65jpF
— Chamatkar Sandhu (@SandhuMMA) June 7, 2020
Rematch
The former bantamweight champion also said he is open to a rematch with TJ Dillashaw, who is expected to return next year after he was slapped with a two-year ban for testing positive to a banned substance.
“We’re talking about T.J. who’s still suspended. He’s not even in there, but that’s a fight I’d like to get back.”
“We all know what he was on, we all knew what he was doing, it took so many times for him to skate by USADA, unfortunately.”
“He’s serving his sentence, he’s gonna always have to live with that the rest of his life, he has a child that has eyes on him that knows that his dad was a cheater. The whole world looked up to him, a lot of young kids. It’s sad.”
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(Featured Image Source: Instagram/ Sean O’Malley, Cody Garbrandt, and UFC)