Uros Medic has been living in fast-forward for a while, and UFC Belgrade only cranked the speed up. After smoking Daniel Rodriguez in 30 seconds, “The Doctor” is talking about the bigger picture, and his answer is exactly the kind of chaos you would expect from a man who fights like every round owes him money.
Medic told Josh Thomson on Weighing In that Justin Gaethje is the UFC career model he wants to chase, not because Gaethje played it safe or gamed the rankings, but because the man built a whole brand out of walking into fire and asking for more. Medic also revealed that he believes he has three fights left on his current UFC deal after signing a five-fight contract before the Geoff Neal bout.
Watch the full conversation below.
Medic Wants The Gaethje Blueprint
The Gaethje part came up while Thomson compared Medic’s Belgrade main event to Gaethje’s huge patriotic moment at UFC Freedom 250. Medic understood the comparison immediately. Fighting in Serbia, walking out to “Vidovdan,” and headlining the UFC’s first event in Belgrade was not just another Saturday at the office. That was homeland pressure with the volume knob ripped off.
Medic first described why the Belgrade win left him unable to speak immediately afterward:
“I dimmed down my emotions so much that when I won that fight, I had nothing. I was empty. I had no emotions. It took me a second to kind of start the interview, and then it started pouring out of me, and I almost started crying. But in that moment, when you think you’d be screaming and you’d be relieved, I just — I had nothing, man. I just climbed the cage, and I was looking, and I’m like, man, what a moment for me. What a moment. What a moment in my life, man. That was just probably the biggest thing that’s happened to me so far.”
He then connected that experience to Gaethje’s title win and explained in full why he messaged the lightweight champion:
“To me, it doesn’t get any bigger, any better than this. The song that I picked, the crowd was just blown away. It’s one of our most patriotic songs. Very historical meaning. I said it when I watched Justin Gaethje. I’m like, ‘Man, I need to experience this. I need to feel these feelings,’ because he was standing there with the American flag in front of the Declaration of Independence. I thought of that as being the most patriotic scene in all of sports history. I have never seen anything like that. For me, as a non-American, to feel such pride and such, like, feeling of patriotism, I’m like, this man — what he’s feeling right now, it cannot be compared to anything in the world. And for him to win and take the belt home, I mean, I generally don’t message other athletes. I know Justin. We are managed by the same guy. But I sent him a message. I said, ‘Man, if there’s one athlete I’d like to be like, and the way you fight, like I would like, for me, this is how I want my career to be like — like Justin Gaethje,’ because he is the definition of a fighter. Like, you know, just fucking to the death. Violence to the death. If it means death, so be it, you know?”
Gaethje’s path to that championship moment included the Dustin Poirier rematch buildup at UFC 291, another example of the high-risk career Medic wants to emulate.
The contract piece matters because Medic is suddenly in an interesting spot at 170 pounds. He knocked out Geoff Neal, blasted Rodriguez, and now has enough momentum to ask for bigger names without sounding like he is yelling into the void. He has also been dealing with a knee issue from fight week, with Medic discussing a noninvasive procedure and recovery time during the interview.
Josh Thomson asked how many fights remained on Medic’s contract, whether renewal talks had started, and whether the UFC had offered another opponent after his 30-second finish. Medic answered:
“Honestly, I don’t know the contract I have, and I think at least three more. I just signed a five-fight deal before Geoff Neal, so I did two fucking 30-second fights.”
Medic then detailed what he wants the rest of that UFC run to look like:
“To me, my goal is to just leave a mark like that in the fighting world. Just come in, be super violent, have a lot of fights and a lot of finishes. You know, obviously every athlete dreams of obtaining a belt. This is the ultimate dream. This is cementing your name in history forever. This is my goal and every fighter’s goal. But along that, I just want to be the fucking violent guy that’s going to go and put it on there, and for the other guy to know that he’s in for a fucking car crash when he gets there. Like, you’ve got to know that. You’ve got to be aware, you know? And that’s, I think, the way to go about it in this sport, in this fight business.”
After Thomson listed Medic’s four recent finishes — Gilbert Urbina in 1:30, Muslim Salikhov in 1:03, Geoff Neal in 1:19, and Rodriguez in 30 seconds — Medic responded:
“It’s incredible. I’m going to keep it rolling, man. I don’t think there’s anybody else that has a start like me. Obviously these guys, you know, D-Rod called me a one-round fighter. I’ve been past the one round, and I’ve finished other guys in late rounds, in the second round. Omar Morales, who’s never been finished before in the UFC. Matt Semelsberger, who’s never been knocked out before me in the UFC. These are all things you can check. They might have been submitted — don’t hold my word on that — but they’ve never been knocked out or TKO’d. So for me to do all of that in the later rounds against guys that have fought some really tough competition and have not been knocked out or finished, to me that’s also very impressive. It gets overlooked. Nobody really pays attention to that. And I mean, those guys are no longer in the UFC, but that doesn’t make them any less of a fighter, because they’ve been in the UFC for a long time as well.”
Medic said viewers have learned not to look away during his fights:
“People complain to me, ‘Man, I didn’t even get a chance. I went to the fridge, I opened my beer, and the fight was over.’ And, you know, I think everybody is learning by this time that, when I’m fighting, you’ve got to be glued to the screen because it’s going to be fast, it’s going to be spectacular, and it’s going to be freaking quick.”
That gives the UFC room to test whether Medic is a fun-action killer or a real problem near the top of the division. The welterweight lane has been messy for a while, and even Geoff Neal was already eyeing Carlos Prates and Colby Covington before Medic forced his own name into the conversation.
Gaethje became beloved because even his losses felt like events. Medic seems to understand that better than most. He is not promising a clean spreadsheet career. He is chasing moments, damage, and enough wins to make the UFC keep handing him bigger problems. After Belgrade, that pitch is getting harder to ignore.
