{"id":774899,"date":"2026-07-02T19:22:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T19:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/774899\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T19:22:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T19:22:09","slug":"kamaru-usman-caught-off-guard-by-ufc-oklahoma-claims-dricus-du-plessis-fight-was-mentioned-but-not-offered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/774899\/","title":{"rendered":"Kamaru Usman caught off guard by UFC Oklahoma, claims Dricus Du Plessis fight was \u2018mentioned\u2019 but \u2018not offered\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI\u2019ve just been ready to fight since February \u2014 well, I asked for a fight since then,\u201d Usman said on his Pound 4 Pound podcast<\/a>. \u201cAnd it was like, \u2018Ah, we don\u2019t know.\u2019 We all know which fight that I wanted. I wanted that fight. And so I think there was just a lot of back and forth stuff being done, and now we kind of hear all the stories of potentially they were trying to make Ilia versus Islam and all of these things, and I wanted the Islam fight. So all of these things behind the scenes kind of dragged on. And then DDP was mentioned, not really offered, but mentioned, and I said, yeah, if that\u2019s \u2026 I just need something that gets me to the title. I just want that. You\u2019re not gonna give me the title, then give me something that gets me to the title. And so this wasn\u2019t really offered. He was mentioned.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI said, Okay, let\u2019s [fight Du Plessis] soon at [UFC 327 in] Miami, I even asked that,\u201d Usman continued. \u201cAnd then he was like, \u2018Yeah, Miami\u2019s too soon, he might not be ready.\u2019 And so, it is what it is. So I thought the fight was off, it wasn\u2019t gonna happen, and then there was, like, oh, then it\u2019s potentially gonna happen. Obviously, there\u2019s some logistics you have to work through when you\u2019re at this level and that\u2019s what it was. And then finally, I guess it was announced. I\u2019m like, \u2018Well, shit, I guess it\u2019s happening, let me go ahead and prepare.\u2019 There\u2019s still a club that I\u2019m not in yet and I want to be in that [champ champ] club. So it\u2019s something that I\u2019m still chasing and something that\u2019s still very attractive to me in the sport. So, I\u2019m gonna pursue that. Whoever the opponent is, it doesn\u2019t really matter to me at this point, because it\u2019s bigger than just a fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

To see who else is fighting at UFC Oklahoma later this month click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI\u2019ve just been ready to fight since February \u2014 well, I asked for a fight since then,\u201d Usman…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":774900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,40762,785,85,1396,179146,1647],"class_list":["post-774899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc-news","tag-ufc-on-paramount","tag-upcoming-ufc-events"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774899","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=774899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=774899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=774899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=774899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}