Paul Craig is here at middleweight, and he’s looking to make a big impression.
On Saturday, Craig made a triumphant middleweight debut, finishing Andre Muniz with strikes from the mount position at UFC London. Currently ranked No. 9 in the UFC’s light heavyweight rankings, Craig was doing just fine up at 205 pounds, but after having his first fight down a weight class, “Bearjew” feels right at home at 185 pounds.
“When the UFC offered me this fight, [it’s] the UFC, you don’t really get a chance to be like, ‘No, we don’t really want this fight. Can we have an easier fight?’” Craig said on the ESPN post-fight show. “[I] want to fight in the top 15 because ultimately, if I can’t hang with them in the light heavyweight division, and I can’t hang in the other divisions, this comes to the end of my journey. My journey is about how far I can go and be an MMA champion. That’s what I want to do, and as we moved down, we wanted a top 15 opponent, and we got it.
“Then everybody started saying, ‘He broke Jacare’s arm. He did the same to Eryk Anders. Maybe Paul’s jiu-jitsu isn’t as a good, because he’s just a wee guy from Scotland.’ A Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt from Brazil, who is a high-level grappler. [But] this isn’t grappling, this is MMA. What my coach told me was, ‘Don’t give him this gentleman’s agreement, oh, we’ll go for a submission and then spin and it’s a nice flow grapple. Punish him! If you get on top, punish him and make him know this isn’t jiu-jitsu, this is MMA. This is middleweight in the UFC.’ And it definitely showed.
“As a middleweight, I believe I made a statement, and striking-wise, I think I looked good.”
Heading into the fight, Muniz was ranked No. 14 in the UFC’s middleweight rankings, meaning Craig will likely have a number next to his name in two divisions next week.
And while he isn’t closing the door on light heavyweight permanently, Craig plans to stick around 185 pounds for the time being.
“What I want to do is be in the top 15. I’m No. 9 in the light heavyweight [rankings],” Craig said. “That journey is not over. I’m the only person to have a victory over the ex-champion Jamahal Hill and [Magomed] Ankalaev. They’re the top guys in this division, so I believe I can still hang with those guys. If I move back up from middleweight to light heavyweight, it will be a more scientific approach, [like] what we did to come down to middleweight. We’re going to put on more mass, and then from that we’ll then assess where we’re going to go.”
As long as he’s going to be a middleweight, Craig is looking for the biggest fights possible; specifically, he wants to welcome the highly-touted prospect Bo Nickal to the top of the 185-pound division.
“As a middleweight? I kind of like Bo Nickal as a fight,” Craig said. “Nobody wants to fight him. But then if he takes me down, he better be good at passing guard, because I’m very good at retaining guard.
“He’s a name. He’s a name and he can play into my game plan, where he gets in tight, takes me down, and it just fits me better. That’s one of the things we knew Andre Muniz would do. He would take us down into guard, and that’s where I do my best work. If he puts me down on my back, then I’m able to scramble, look for these triangles, look for these armbars.”
Nickal recently earned the first TKO of his UFC career, stopping Val Woodburn in just 38 seconds at UFC 290. Following that performance, Nickal hinted that he may take some time off from fighting as he continues working toward his own eventual title aspirations.