UFC 308: Chimaev on Whittaker – “He knows how to lose…I don’t”

Khamzat Chimaev has made it to UFC 308 fight week after suffering another illness that ruled him out of the main event of UFC Fight Night: Saudi Arabia.

Chimaev appears healthy and happy and as confident as ever, although he was cautious in suggesting he would easily defeat his opponent Robert Whittaker.

“Anyone at the top could be a tough fight,” he said at UFC 308 media day when asked to predict. “Someone might be easy to fight. We’ll see. Maybe it’s an easy fight. Maybe it’s an uphill battle for me. So we don’t know.”

“He knows how to lose. We don’t know. So I’m ready for Whittaker.”

There’s been a lot of talk about how “The Reaper” simply had to survive Chimaev’s early blitz before his cardio failed. “Borz” dismissed this criticism of his game and said he was dealing with more health issues when his gas tank sputtered in his last fight against Kamaru Usman.

“I pushed from the first to the last second in my sparring and I don’t think it would be any different here in the cage,” Chimaev said. “[No one] I didn’t say anything about my health before the Usman fight. Everyone thinks Khamzat went into the cage healthy. That wasn’t it. I was sick the morning before this fight.”

“I don’t make excuses, I don’t cry,” he added. “For example, I had a short, short-term argument. I also step in at short notice with my struggles, you know? We are all fighters, we don’t need to make excuses. If I lose in a fight, I’ll just shut up and go home.”

“Borz” said he hoped to beat Whittaker so convincingly that he would take the No. 1 contender spot away from Sean Strickland.

“I hope so,” he said. “But they said that before when I beat Gilbert Burns. [That was a] A long time ago, about 2 or 3 years ago. I didn’t do it [get] my chance after that. Then Usman. I beat Usman and didn’t win the title. But we’ll see.

“I’m happy with the money. I also make more money than any other champion.”