Alex Pereira doesn’t consider Jamahal Hill to be even the second-best 205-pounder ahead of their UFC 300 title fight.
Pereira will be putting the UFC Light Heavyweight Championship on the line against Jamahal Hill on April 13. “Poatan” won the title that Hill was forced to vacate due to a ruptured Achilles. Now, the two will collide inside the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada for a historic event.
But in Pereira’s mind, he will not be facing his toughest challenger.
Alex Pereira On Jamahal Hill Not Being The Runner-Up At Light Heavyweight
Alex Pereira was a guest on “The MMA Hour,” along with his coach Plinio Cruz, who provided translations. On the show, “Poatan” told Ariel Helwani that there are other light heavyweights who he feels are above Jamahal Hill in terms of all-around game.
“He’s not second-best, at least four,” Pereira’s coach translated. “Let’s say right now after this fight he’ll be coming up for light heavyweight and they offer him Jan Blachowicz, Jiri Prochazka, Jamahal Hill. Pick one of those three before you make your light heavyweight debut, he feels that the best fight for him for those three that he would get right away would be Jamahal Hill.”
Another fighter that appears to have piqued the interest of Pereira is Magomed Ankalaev. The Brazilian bruiser explained why.
“Well, that would be good because that’ll be an aspect to prove some people, not really the fans, but some specialists claim a bunch of stuff, saying Ankalaev is the guy to beat him and this and that. Sometimes, the fighter wants to prove to himself, prove to everybody and that’ll be a good chance to shut everybody up about his ground game.”
It’ll be interesting to see how Pereira vs. Hill unfolds this spring. Hopefully all goes well ahead of fight night and this bout goes down without a hitch.
Alex Pereira’s full appearance on “The MMA Hour” can be seen below:
