Gaethje: Conor’s Confident Enough To Fight Me

After his 40-second knockout of Donald Cerrone, many from across the fight world are talking about a fight with Conor McGregor, one of which is Justin Gaethje.

Gaethje, who has been calling out McGregor for almost a year, told the Punchlines Podcast that a fight with McGregor feels more possible than ever.

“Ultimately that dude makes his own decisions, and I think he has more confidence now,” Gaethje said. “He needed a win. So yeah, I think he’ll fight me now.”

“I’m not necessarily being overlooked,” Gaethje said of his place in the UFC’s lightweight division.

“I’m in the conversation. I lost two times not that long ago, and unfortunately that set me back and that allows these people to have an argument or a case when it comes to the argument or it comes to this circumstance. . . So it does suck to compete as hard as I do and to put as much as I do into it and to maybe have the situation come along where I do get passed over because of money or politics. But at the end of the day if you do keep winning, I’m gonna fight again and if I win, if I knock somebody out again, they can’t deny me.”

“To be a superstar you have to win and you have to have something special,” Gaethje said, the man who McGregor’s head coach, John Kavanagh, wants to see fight next at welterweight. “For me, I hope that knocking people out is my something special because I can’t sell myself, per se, and become a different person on camera and a different person off camera…”

“Ultimately, I think it could hurt me in the long run, just not wanting to take that route. I could have been there [at UFC 246]. I could have been front row. I could have made a scene, but I don’t know. And maybe I’ll miss an opportunity because I wasn’t there.”

Report: MMA Fighting