Watch: Alex Pereira admits he ‘didn’t envision’ title bout with Khalil Rountree

Alex Pereira’s newest pit-stop en path to a presumed post-career slot within the UFC Corridor of Fame takes him to Salt Lake Metropolis this weekend — but it surely’s not towards an opponent that wasn’t fairly on his radar.

The UFC’s 205-pound champion will combat the eighth-ranked fighter in his division, Khalil Rountree, within the UFC 307 headliner on Saturday evening, and whereas it guarantees to be an intriguing stand-up affair between two putting specialists, Pereira instructed the media on Wednesday in Utah — together with The Mac Life — that he’s just a little shocked by the matchmaking.

“No I didn’t envision that,” Pereira mentioned, through his interpreter, including that regardless of Rountree being “far behind within the rankings” his function as champion calls for that he be “ready for every little thing.”

“I noticed his combat with Gokhan Saki, I noticed some issues Khalil had completed there, issues I studied in that combat which he gained. I noticed the combat towards Dustin Jacoby, and I believe he didn’t win that combat,” he added on his opponent.

Hypothesis has been rampant in current months that Pereira will at some point quickly resolve to problem himself at heavyweight in a bid that would, in principle not less than, stand him alone as the primary three-division champion in UFC historical past. However confronted with that prospect, or certainly a transfer again all the way down to 185 to reclaim the middleweight title now held by Dricus Du Plessis, Pereira says that he’s content material to stay round and deal with his enterprise at 205.

“I’d really select to defend my [light heavyweight] belt,” he mentioned of his most popular subsequent transfer. “For me to go in a decrease weight class would take a while, want some extra preparation. For me to go to a better weight class, it additionally takes extra preparation. So now the best way that it’s, mild heavyweight’s excellent.”