Shortly after his third-round TKO of Krzysztof Jotko, Hawaiian middleweight Brad Tavares called for a scrap with former UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping. Just in case the callout wasn’t enough, Tavares then sought the former champ out backstage, where he called him out in person.
See the video of the pair’s backstage encounter, which was filmed and posted to Tavares’s Instagram, at the top of this post.
“Get the fuck out,” Bisping can be heard saying in the video, which we can probably take as a joke, given the chorus of laughter that followed.
“C’mon, let’s do it,” Tavares responds.
Here it is from another angle:
Bisping later gave his thoughts on a potential matchup with Tavares from his perch on the Fox Sports analysts desk.
https://twitter.com/UFCONFOX/status/985563412745850882
“Well, well, well, listen…” Bisping said in response to this callout. “I don’t need anything. I certainly don’t need anything from you, Mr. Brad Tavares, you couldn’t shine my shoes. And I may have said ‘get out,’ but I said it friendly. He’s trying to make it sound like I was all hostile. I sat there, I didn’t even move. I think I was eating a bag of chips. I was like, ah this guy, ‘you just got your ass kicked off Jotko…’ He walked in, trying to act big-time. Come on, get out pal. Brad, there’s never, ever anything that you have, that I would need.”
Needless to say, Bisping doesn’t seem interested in a potential fight with Tavares. Given that Bisping’s next fight is likely to be his last, however, it’s fair that he’s keen to hold out for as big a name as possible.
Does a fight between Brad Tavares and Michael Bisping interest you? If not, who would you like to see Bisping fight in his retirement bout? Join the conversation in the comments section.
This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 4/16/2018.