Outside Source
Things are heating up between Kamaru Usman and Belal Muhammad.
The beef between the two first started with Usman (20-4) criticizing Muhammad (24-3) for refusing to fight his friend and teammate Islam Makhachev. Muhammad responded with a long rant, mocking Usman’s recent inactivity, labelling him a “podcaster.” Muhammad also accused “The Nigerian Nightmare” of shying away from tough competition during his welterweight title reign.
Usman now says that tension between them has risen to the point where security will be needed if they come across each other at an event where they both aren’t competing. While Usman claims to be a collected person outside the Octagon, he also believes fighters are always on alert when “in the thick of it,” which he hasn’t been for a while.
“Probably [security will be needed]… I’m very level headed, especially when I’m outside of the cage,” Usman told ESPN. “But for almost two years now, I haven’t been in the thick of it. There’s a transition when you’re not. People expect us to be these fighters and we’re always on go mode. When I’m outside of the cage, people are like, ‘Why are you so calm? You’re a scary fighter.’ But I’m not like that. So when you’re in the thick of it, you’re on alert all the time… And I haven’t been that for a while. But now that we’re back in the thick of it, yeah, you’d probably have to have security back there with us.”
Usman lost his title to Leon Edwards in 2022 and failed to reclaim it in their rematch. He then went up for a one-off middleweight outing against Khamzat Chimaev, where he dropped a decision in October 2023 and hasn’t competed since. The 37-year-old will return against Joaquin Buckley (21-6) in the UFC on ESPN 69 main event on June 14 at State Farm Arena in Atlanta.
Meanwhile, Muhammad dethroned Edwards via unanimous decision last year. “Remember the Name” is set to defend his title for the first time against Jack Della Maddalena (17-2) at UFC 315 on May 10 at Bell Centre in Montreal.
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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