Jimi Manuwa and Daniel Cormier have been building up a potential fight with each other with Manuwa climbing his way up to a title shot, currently sitting at #3 on the official UFC light heavyweight rankings.
Cormier and Manuwa even agreed to fight during a heated twitter exchange. However, Manuwa said when it came down to seeing each other in person when they were both backstage at an event, Cormier didn’t have much to say when they were in close proximity.
“D.C. started trying to trash talk and sh*t like that, but he knew what was going on backstage when we met face to face and he didn’t have a lot to say,” said Manuwa on the Top Turtle MMA podcast (transcribed by FloCombat). “I don’t do the talking thing I do the fighting thing.
“He tried to make a joke with Kamaru Usman, who I was talking to. He was about ten feet away and he asked Usman to feel me and see if I felt strong and I told him why don’t he come over and talk for himself. I told him, ‘This ain’t no big brother sh*t,’ where like what he was doing with Anthony Johnson. We are from London and I punch people in the face if they disrespect us.
“He knew I wasn’t up for any of that smack-talk. That was that, but you know what? D.C. is a great fighter, and I respect him as a champion, but if we are going to fight we are going to fight. There’s no two ways about it.”
Manuwa added that he isn’t making any attempts to pull any “WWE sh*t” and talk his way into popularity, which has been a key ingredient to Conor McGregor’s massive success. “Posterboy,” says that he just lets his fighting to do all the talking, noting his 16 of 17 wins being finishes.
“I talk facts, I don’t talk sh*t. I don’t talk to try to get the fans or get pay-per-view points. I knock people out and I’m an exciting fighter. I don’t take people down and lay on people and have the crowd booing. I knock people out and get the crowd and fans excited. My fighting speaks for itself.”
Who would you like to see Jimi Manuwa fight next? Let’s put your matchmaking skills to work and let us know in the comment section!
This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 5/3/2017.