Tyron Woodley On Carlos Condit Fight: I Was The Only One Who Stepped Up

Tyron Woodley has been pretty outspoken regarding his future in the UFC welterweight division, at times declaring himself ‘the future’ of the heavily stacked weight category. He may well be right, but first he has to get past Carlos Condit at UFC 171; and that is a pretty mean bridge to cross.

‘The Natural Born Killer’ has earned his nickname through countless wars and savage knockout wins, I wouldn’t expect this to be an easy fight for either man, but Woodley has his own opinion of Condit’s style:

“He point fights,” Woodley told MMAjunkie. “He moves around. He sticks and moves. He doesn’t just come out there and start banging on people. That’s not his style. He comes out there, and he overwhelms you with volume. He point fights.”

“Point fighting is point fighting,” Woodley said. “When you have enough points and you overwhelm guys, you do have the ability to finish toward the end of the fight. He makes you chase him, and when he has enough points, he’ll finish you.”

The traffic at the top end of the 170-pound class is always super-talented; especially when you consider that guy like Matt Brown, Demain Maia, Hector Lombard, Jake Shields and Jake Ellenberger aren’t even in the title line right now. T-Wood continued:

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“Rory MacDonald should go and cut another avocado because I don’t think he deserves a world title fight,” Woodley said. “He didn’t want to fight the champion when he was there. He was a top three welterweight, and he refused to fight for a title, but now all of the sudden GSP hangs it up for a little bit, and he wants to jump in after a victory over Demian Maia? Not sure about that.”

It’s hard to believe, but Woodley is not even a top 10 fighter at WW right now, a win over Condit would change that massively, but the way he talks about ‘cutting in line’ leaves me sensing a lot of irony in his comments.

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“For those guys coming off big wins, that’s great, but who stepped up and fought Carlos Condit when he needed an opponent?” Woodley said. “He’s the No. 2 in the world. Everyone was sitting around knowing Condit didn’t have a fight, and I was the only one who stepped up.”

“He hasn’t won a fight since 2011,” Woodley said of Nick Diaz. “He lost to Carlos Condit, he lost to GSP, and he hasn’t beat a wrestler in his life. So you’re going to come out retirement whenever you feel like it and just jump right into a title shot? I don’t buy it.”

I’m really excited to see if Woodley can back up his word, of which he has plenty, and his moniker of ‘The Chosen One’. If not, T-Wood may experience a fall from a great height against CC at 171. ‘NBK’ has been a mainstay at welterweight for one main reason; the guy is a real-deal badass.

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Woodley woukld do well to realize the challenge that lays before him, as Condit is one guy you definitely do not want to look past. The Jackson’s product has finished 27 of his 29 wins, and has faced a lot of highly touted knockout artists in his time. Welterweight is still a very exciting place in the UFC.

Photo: Tom Szczerbowski for USA TODAY Sports