post-fight press conference<\/a>. \u201cThe guy is the pound-for-pound No. 1 in the world and the champion of my division. However, when you come into my division and you are the only thing that stops me, that is in the way of me achieving my dreams, I\u2019m going to make sure that I punch a hole in your head. He has to fight me next. There is nobody that has fought a deeper division, that has fought the guys from top to bottom. You name them: [Daniel Rodriguez]. [Neil] Magny. Geoff Neal. [Michael Page]. Shavkat. Prates. And now Belal Muhammad? And I haven\u2019t even got a title shot yet? And they\u2019re going to throw some flashes in the pan out there? Not a chance. Not on my watch. Over my dead body.<\/p>\n\u201cIslam Makhachev is the prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Khabib. I am the prot\u00e9g\u00e9 of Conor, right? This is the new wave of Dagestan. A more technical on the feet, a more technical grappler than Khabib. I am a longer, faster, more versatile version of Conor, right? It\u2019s the perfect fight to make. He has to take me down. I have to keep it on the feet. He can choose it wherever he wants, the ball\u2019s in his court, whenever he\u2019s ready, whenever he wants. If he wants to do it in Dagestan, Russia, I will see him there. I\u2019m not afraid of any man walking this Earth, but he has to do the right thing now. He has to do the right thing. He has a duty as champion of the welterweight division to fight the best in the world. Tonight, I proved I\u2019m the best in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Garry has indeed tested himself against a number of top contenders, but nothing is guaranteed for \u201cThe Future.\u201d Former champion Usman appears to be the name Makhachev is most interested in, and Rakhmonov is Garry\u2019s lone defeat in the UFC.<\/p>\n
However, Garry is confident his health and availability make him more likely to get the Makhachev fight than those two standouts.<\/p>\n
\u201cKamaru Usman has just had double knee surgery,\u201d Garry said. \u201cAnd Shavkat Rakhmonov has had two knee surgeries in a row, so both of them are very struggling right now, aren\u2019t they? Kamaru Usman is irrelevant. He shouldn\u2019t be mentioned in this title contention. It\u2019s ridiculous. It\u2019s Khabib\u2019s camp being smart and trying to get a has-been who has name value for Islam to get his 17th consecutive win. That\u2019s a cop-out as a champion. That fight cannot happen because that is not the right thing to do. That is not the duty of the world champion. He\u2019s meant to fight the best in the world, of which that is me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShavkat Rakhmonov, I love him, I have nothing but respect for him, but I busted his knee up pretty bad in that fight just like I did to Belal tonight, right?\u201d Garry added. \u201cHe has had two knee surgeries, the first one failed, he\u2019s still checking the second one out. We won\u2019t see him for very long.\u201d<\/p>\n
One name that has soared up the welterweight rankings is the undefeated Morales. The Ecuadorian star picked up the biggest win of his career at UFC 322, knocking out fellow contender Sean Brady inside of a round.<\/p>\n
At 26, Morales is one of the most promising young fighters in all of MMA, but Garry believes he still has more work to do before moving to the front of the line.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s flash in the pan,\u201d Garry said of Morales. \u201cHe\u2019s not done what I\u2019ve done. He\u2019s not had the road that I\u2019ve had. He\u2019s not fought the guys that I\u2019ve had. I just beat Carlos Prates and I just beat Belal Muhammad, two guys that are the best in the world. Before that, I fought Shavkat. Before that I fought MVP, before that I fought Geoff Neal. The list goes on.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no one who has been tested more than me, there is no one that has been through it more than me. The highs, the lows, the booing, whatever it is, I am a polarizing figure, but I am the best in the world, so you cannot count me out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ian Machado Garry thinks he\u2019s done enough to be the No. 1 contender in the UFC welterweight division.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":303691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,1347,785,85,787,1396],"class_list":["post-303690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/303691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}