Gegard Mousasi won the Bellator middleweight championship after finishing off the three-time defending champion Rafael Carvalho via first-round TKO at Bellator 200 last week.
Following an impressive win, Mousasi called out for a long-desired matchup with welterweight champion Rory MacDonald. MacDonald accepts Mousasi’s challenge said ‘Let’s make this happen.’ and directed a message to CEO Scott Coker to materialize this fight.
During a recent appearance on “The MMA Hour,” Mousasi sent a sterned warning to MacDonald:
“Listen, I’m no Michael Bisping,” Mousasi said. “I know what Georges St-Pierre did, but believe me, I’m physically a lot stronger than Michael Bisping. Technically, I’m better. So it’s almost the same fight, GSP vs. Michael Bisping, but now it’s Rory against me.”
“I think he doesn’t know. He’s a big welterweight, but still, he doesn’t have anything over me that I’m impressed by — let’s say wrestling or standup, or he doesn’t have the reach, speed, the striking. So I don’t know. I’ve trained with Douglas Lima, he’s a tough kid, but I could feel the weight difference.
“I don’t know if [MacDonald] thinks it’s easy, but he will feel it in the fight,” Mousasi continued. “I feel like I’m one of the strong middleweights, physically. If they’re not on steroids, I’m physically one of the strongest.”
Both fighters have both gone 2-0 since making a transition from the UFC to Bellator, with MacDonald knocking off Paul Daley and Douglas Lima, and Mousasi defeated Alexander Shlemenko and Carvalho.
“The Dreamcatcher,” said a contest between himself and “Red King” would be as big as the UFC’s last undisputed middleweight title, which saw Michael Bisping clashed with Georges St-Pierre at UFC 217. Mousasi feels the Canadian is the perfect next opponent for him and would add value to his stock.
“I think Rory is a big name. It’s a fight that everyone wants to see. I want to make the fight, I think Rory wants to make the fight,” Mousasi said. “Rory started with wanting to come up in weight and we like the fight, so he said it and we replied a hundred times, and now, I don’t know, it’s not up to me. Like Rory said, it’s up to Bellator.”
Now Bellator needs to do their job to book a champion vs. champion bout.
