Dustin Poirier said that he holds the technical advantage in his hotly-anticipated rematch with Justin Gaethje at UFC 291.
Poirier and Gaethje face off in Saturday night’s main event in Salt Lake City with the BMF title up for grabs, and fans are anticipating another all-out war between the pair.
Speaking to the press at media day, Poirier reacted to earlier comments from Gaethje that “The Highlight” would fight Poirier in a more technical style than we’ve seen from him in the past. Poirier seemed intrigued by the comment, but suggested that it was a bad tactic.
“If he wants to technically kickbox with me and grapple with me, I think his best chances are to catch me being crazy and landing a shot,” he said.
“If he tries to take his time and be methodical, I’m going to show you levels, for sure.”
Rather than a clean, technical battle, Poirier is expecting a full-blooded war to match some of their past fights in the Octagon, including their prior meeting back in 2018 that Poirier won by fourth-round TKO.
“Everyone knows what this is, and I’m willing to go there,” Poirier said.
“I think that’s where I do my best work. The fact that the fans, and Justin — and he doesn’t go out of his way to portray that, he just that aura about him with the chaos, most violent — but I am that, and he knows that. Let’s go there.”
Such is the level of violence expected when they meet this weekend, Poirier admitted that even getting the phone call offering the fight gave him pre-fight nerves.
“When they called me – because we were talking about doing this fight with Justin potentially being the opponent – those butterflies, that anxiety, hit me right away,” he said.
“Like, ‘We have to do this. This is the one.’ It was five years ago I beat him. He’s done great things, I’ve done great things and we were just on a collision course to do it again.
“(It’s) No. 2 (versus) No. 3 – No. 1 is fighting the champ. It just makes sense in the division as well.”