MORNING KOMBAT WITH LUKE THOMAS AND BRIAN CAMPBELL - Alexander Volkanovski Explains the Uniqueness of His Style, Talks Lightweight Move | Alexander Volkanovski Interview

Episode Date: April 13, 2022

Luke Thomas sits down with Alexander Volkanovski following his UFC 273 win over the Korean Zombie. What does Alexander think of his UFC 273 performance? Is Max Holloway his next fight or is he considering a move to 155? The guys discuss it all. (00:45) - Arriving in NYC (1:35) - Korean Zombie Gameplan/Fight (10:40) - Throwing in the towel (12:20) - Fan/Media Talk (14:45) - Max Holloway Trilogy (20:00) - Evolution on MMA (26:00) - Moving up to 155 (28:45) - Luke Travels to Australia? Morning Kombat’ is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Bullhorn and wherever else you listen to podcasts.    For more Combat Sports coverage subscribe here: youtube.com/MorningKombat   Follow our hosts on Twitter: @BCampbellCBS, @lthomasnews, @MorningKombat    For Morning Kombat gear visit:morning kombat.store   Follow our hosts on Instagram: @BrianCampbell, @lukethomasnews, @MorningKombat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Introducing the new McSpicy from McDonald's. It looks like a regular chicken sandwich, but it's actually a spicy chicken sandwich. McSpicy. Consider yourself warned. Limited time only. At participating McDonald's in Canada. You know, I called for it because I think I earned it. We're seeing guys get the chance at a second title

for much less than what I've done. You know what I mean? So I don't So I'll be, I don't think I'll waste my time unless it is for the belt. All right, everyone, Luke Thomas here in New York City with a man who does not need an introduction, so I'll make it quite brief. He just defended his UFC featherweight title when he absolutely obliterated the Korean zombie in the main event of UFC 273. And he is here to talk about that and a whole lot more.

It is the one and only Alexander Volkanovski. Hi, Mr. Volkanovski. How are you? I'm very good. I'm very good. How are you? Good. New York City treating you well? Yeah, it's been good. It's pretty cold. Colder than what I'm used to, but I mean, we're enjoying it. How cold does it get in Australia, your neck of the woods? Oh, man. What would it get? I don't know. It wouldn't get much colder than this.

This is about as cold as it gets. Yeah, I'd say this is pretty cold. Have you tried any of the New York pizza? I did, yeah. We did that yesterday. So I've already knocked over a couple things. The bagels and the pizza. Okay. So your New York pizza and bagels.

The people in Jersey will tell you that they have both better bagels and better pizza. Oh, really? You should know that they're lying. Okay. That's not at all true. How are you feeling? I'm feeling good. Feeling good.

Just a couple of nicks and scrapes, not that much. Yeah, not too much. Not too much. Maybe from punching and kicking, I've got a little bit more, you know, the hands and feet. But other than that, it's just a part of it. Usually my shin and feet usually get pretty sore from fights. Right.

I'm pretty low kick heavy, as you would know. Yeah. So they usually get a little tender a bit after the fight, but it's all good. Okay, all right, let's talk about the fight. Boy, that was about as close to best-case scenario. Nothing is perfect, so probably not that. So I'm not going to ask you for a grade, but I am going to ask, relative to what you guys had planned or anticipated,

where did the actual performance fit? It went pretty much how we expected it to go. He did what we thought he would do. And, yeah, you know, that's why, again, you're going to give everyone the respect early. So you're going to, you know, start off at a range where, you know, they barely can touch you and then work your way in and find that range that you're comfortable at.

And, yeah, pretty much exactly what we worked on worked. You know what I mean? I didn't have to change too much. I could stick to my style and have my way with him that way. you know what i mean i didn't have to change too much i could stick to uh my style and and uh have my way with him that way you know what i mean and that's no disrespect to him but like i like i said leading up and i would have said to you my style covered a lot of ground um in this fight and a lot of fights you know that's that's the way my style is you know i can cover a lot of ground there where i don't uh you know i don't take unnecessary risks and i capitalize it and you know i enter at the right time and things like that.

So that went a long way for me. It was kind of funny, the post-fight narrative. A lot of people were hyping up your speed. And yes, of course, you are quite fast. I don't mean to say that that is false. But it seemed to me that a bigger determination of how you were able to land and not get hit, there was a lot of times you were catching him at the end of his punches, he was reaching and then you'd pop him for it.

That's a timing issue, right? That's less speed, more timing. Yeah, yeah. Obviously we're drawing the punches out of him. We're not giving too much away. Obviously we do the fakes, but sometimes with your fakes you can do that little bit more to get that reaction because sometimes they might not bite on subtle fakes. So we wanted to really draw the punches out of him.

So you sort of go a little bit deeper and things like that and draw him right out. Like I said, everything we thought would happen happened, and we capitalized on it. All right, so let's talk about the game plan here a little bit. I know this is going to be like me trying to catch you like you catch the opponents, and I'm probably not going to have a whole lot of success either, but I'm going to try a little bit here. So with respecting that you don't want to give away things, still, it did look to me like I could not tell if this was a specific

game plan just for him, or this is something, because I feel like you kind of do this all the time, but it looked to me like right away, taking away his jab was pretty important. There was a lot of times you were parrying and then throwing the left hook because I think he has the other side hand down. There were times when you were using the body kick as he was pressing into you. Was taking away the jab a central focus of the game plan? Yeah, again, without giving too much away. But look, it wasn't really just taking out the jab, but it was just not letting him use other tools as well, you know, things that been in the right position at the right time

and then taking away, you know, his power shots and what he looks for, you know, mainly, and then, you know, capitalize on that, you know, not giving him much opportunity to throw anything else other than some jabs that were never going to really hit anyway. But, yeah, I mean,

it wasn't really just take out the jab, but there was a few things that we had to do. Was that giving too much away? Yeah, yeah. Okay, so, but... Then tell me this. Well, in terms of what his number one or number two weapons that you were focused on,

again, I know you're focused on your strengths, but being cautious and wary of what he's doing, what were you and your team identifying as things to be conscious of that he might try? I mean, obviously counters. Everyone will know he'll eat one to give one. He's the type of guy that he'll catch you coming in. And they're always dangerous as well. So that's why, like I was saying, you can't just expect little fakes to go and then go in.

Because if he's not reacting to them little fakes and then you try and commit, that's when he's going to catch her. If he's not reacting on them subtle fakes, he will react to the committed punches. And so we had to really, really sell our, you know, things before them entries, you know, really sell them so he could not tell the difference between the two. And as you said, we'll draw the counters out of him because he's really good at reading when you're coming in and when you're not.

We obviously had him confused there because he would bite on things and I wasn't there and then I'd capitalize on that. When did you realize he was in trouble? I mean, I know you had confidence going in before the bell even rang but I'm talking about, there was a moment, I think it was like about one, because you re-watched the fight, right? Yep. Okay, a little bit there was a moment one minute into the fight So one minute had expired

He was pressing into you and you had counter him with a couple times and then you had turned the angle and popped his head Back and when you circled back you made a gesture with your mouth like oh like you you there was a clear recognition Yeah, something had worked right away. Well at what point the fight did you realize, this dude's in trouble? Probably since his first jab, to be honest. And I don't mean that in any disrespect. Why the first jab? Oh, like I just seen it coming. And obviously, I was like-

Was it moving in slow motion to you? Yeah, pretty much. You know what I mean? Again, obviously, I was on. Had him, you know, working him how we wanted, had him going wherever. And then even when he thought that he was the time to get me, it was just really obvious for me and pretty slow. So then I was like going, okay, I'm pretty much going to see everything coming now.

So I wanted to capitalize probably earlier on things. I think I could have did a little bit more, but my team were, be careful because, again, he's still going to, even though he's eaten a lot of these shots, you get careless. Yeah, you probably will get the finish, but that risk of you getting caught coming in gets higher too, right? So they were into me and be like, look, just be patient. Keep doing what you're doing.

Don't get too excited straight away. So they were sort of pulling me back when I felt like I could have went in a little bit earlier. But as soon as they said, all right, now let's start following up and doing more, I did. And we got the finish pretty much straight away. One of the crazy things about this was after the second, he did it again in the third round, but after the second round, he went and sat down on the ground, not even on a stool. I got to tell you, I've been watching fights for a long time. I've seen that maybe a handful of times. Did you pay attention to that, or what were you doing in your corner?

I did see that. I don't know whether he'd just rather sit on the floor. I don't think he would because he'd be doing that his whole career, right? That's body language red flag, right? Yeah, yeah. Sometimes you can tell on a fighter's face when they feel defeated. He didn't seem defeated too early, but you could see that he was going well. You know what I mean?

He wasn't comfortable. I even said that in the weigh-in. The weigh-ins and the face-offs. Obviously, he's a nice dude. He doesn't really probably like the face-offs. You could see he was getting uncomfortable there. That's why I wanted to do the face-off and get a little read and I could see he was getting uncomfortable which doesn't really mean much but it means when things aren't going his way or like it means he

can get uncomfortable right he's not really good at hiding it um and I said that that you know once I get him uncomfortable I'm going to know straight away in that fight and I did I could tell straight away and there's signs like that there's signs mid mid fight and just um you know there was a few things that he didn't know I could really read that he was uncomfortable in there but towards the end it was very telling and it was pretty obvious and that's when I started almost feeling bad you know I even think yeah in the fourth round I even said like are you sure you want to keep doing this mate like you know what I mean like I don't know he probably didn't understand me but I mean yeah even uh even if he did understand i'm sure he would have said the same things though yeah more good i'm like you sure like it wasn't me being cheeky or anything like that it was just me

really being like man like you know well the refs probably not going to give it like i felt like he was asking for the to be stopped you know fighters are never going to give up they're never going to sit there and be like i'm done you know what know what I mean? Stop the fight. But I mean, in the last two fights I've seen Ortega and him sort of asking subtly for them to stop it. Like, you know, there's things you don't do when you, you know, if you don't want a ref or the commission or doctors and that to stop a fight, you don't show you're having dramas with things. You don't pretend you can't see. You don't start stumbling and stuff like that.

And he started doing things like that. I was like, oh, I'm the very, very obvious tells. And I'm like, he doesn't want to be here. He's asking for help and they didn't give it to him, same as Ortega. But I mean, there's nothing you can do. But it just shows you, look what I'm doing. These are two guys that are veterans. And these guys, they're no joke and uh i've got them literally crying for help or not crying for help that's probably the wrong word but they're

literally giving up without you know really giving up like this is what i'm doing to some of these guys you know what i mean because it's mentally and physically just it's just too much for them and that's why i'm trying to tell them before the fight, I'm going, these guys can't handle what I'm doing. And that's sort of proof, and I see it. And I can see it in their eyes, especially in that third and fourth round. He was done, and he wanted out. And again, my team said, now we can follow up, do more.

And I gave him that out, but I probably would have preferred the refs and doctors. Like, again, you could tell it wasn't going to go his way anytime soon. So, you know, I'm glad there wasn't stoppage. Have you ever had – obviously, you're the champ, and you was a 21-fight winning streak or something extraordinary like that. But have you ever had that worst-case scenario conversation with Joe Lopez or any of your coaches, like, this is when you can throw the towel, this is when you can't? The reason why I ask is because when I interview boxers,

they seem to always have that arrangement well understood before they even walk into the ring. I don't think we have, to be honest. We haven't had that conversation. But I mean, my team are going to, look man, they should be caring about our health anyway. It doesn't matter if I get angry and all that. At the end of the day, even if it's, oh, I could have won and you lost me this much money. At the end of the day, the health's more important than that. Getting home to your family's healthy is more important. So you can't hate them for that.

You know what I mean? If it was the other way around and they're letting you die for the money, that's when you're probably going to start asking some weird questions, right? That's a tougher conversation, I believe. But at the same time, it depends on the person. If they are still trying to figure out, if he sees me still trying to figure a way to win, because I'm the type of guy,

you're not going to see me give up and I'm going to always look for something. If it's not working, I'm going to keep searching for something that's going to work. And if you see me do that and say it's still not working, I'm just miles behind and my team wants to do that, all right see me do that and say it's still not working, I'm just miles behind and my team wants to do that, all right, I think that's fair. But I mean, if I'm trying to find a way, at least give me a decent chance. It's hard. It's a really tricky one because

I'd expect them to give me that chance, but I wouldn't hate them if they took my help first. You can't hate them for that. And of course, you haven't even been in a scenario where you've approximated this. Exactly, I haven't been. So there's where you can approximate this. I haven't been. So there's not really all that important of a thing to do. Alright, so in talking about

some of the other things around this fight, have you paid at all, I know, so I talked to, we went down to South Florida, we interviewed Gilbert Burns and he was like, when the fight's over,

the only thing I care about is what my family and coaches say. Fair enough. That being said, have you paid attention at all to what the fans have said since your win?

No, not really. I guess I am looking a little bit, but like I said leading in, I'm not too fussed about all that anymore. I'm just going to be me and, again, care what the people I care about. That's what I'm going to... That'll be what I take. I'll take in what they say. They were happy with how things were.

I was even saying to them, I thought I could have done that. You did exactly what we said. That was good. I'm like, okay, all were happy with how things were. I was even saying to them, I thought I could have done that. You did exactly what we said. That was good. You know what I mean? Like, okay, all good. So that's it. They were happy with how things went.

So I'm happy. Yeah. That being said, though, the fans, I've noticed a shift. This one was a shift for me. The Ortega one was also a shift because of just the nature of that fight and the escapes and the submissions and the brutality of it all. I think that was a shift. This was another one, too, where I've called it hater stages of grief. You ever heard about that?

Like when it's like bargaining and acceptance? Yeah. Part of what I've seen is I've seen a lot of this. Okay, I may not like him, but God damn it, he's really good. He's really good. That is hater bargaining, is it not? This is the stage of grief of critics who are finally coming around to an overwhelming case that they just can no longer deny.

Is any of that resonating with you? Yeah, that makes sense. Obviously, I guess you can see that, but I mean, I'm not really looking for it. And the beauty of it is I don't really care, as I've been saying for the past week. And I don't really care. But I mean, I always said that they're going to jump on board.

You know what I mean? Here I was, like, you know, come in and just took over, and a lot of people didn't like it, right? And it just takes time. And the thing is, people act like they haven't seen this before. This has happened plenty of times. Max was in the exact same position for a while where, you know, no one was giving him the recognition he deserved when he was getting these fights.

He was being underdogs against guys like even Ortega and things like that. This just happens. It takes time. But they're all going to jump on board and they're starting to, like you said. I'm going to just be me and I'm happy with how things are going and that's that. I don't need to please the haters. That's one thing that I think I always wanted to do. Prove them wrong and get them on my side. But now I just don't care about that.

I'm just being me and have fun with it. Nothing but positive vibes and enjoying the whole process. Speaking of Max, sometimes I go into these interviews and I don't even want to talk about it. I love Max a lot. I have profound respect for his career. Don't get me wrong. But it's just that you've won twice and so

there's a question of the necessity of the third. Nevertheless though, it just seems like all roads lead to that. I don't know what the UFC is going to do one way or the other. How different will a third fight be with Max? You never know again. we're both both teams obviously you know they're deep in the strategy and all that you know

and they get the game they get the strategy they understand all that and so I guess you're going to have to you're going to have to have certain like a couple of options you know

almost a couple of game plans you know again my style covers a lot of ground but I mean there's going to be you know we're probably going to have game But, I mean, there's going to be, you know, we're probably going to have game plans of strategies we think they're going to have.

And, you know, we're going to have to take that into consideration. But, you know, again, we don't know what's happened. I don't know his situation. I'll be honest. That fight was obviously meant to be early in the year. Oh, sorry. Yeah, earlier in the year we were obviously scheduled and he got injured. But I don't know that situation i don't know if uh there was i don't even know if there's negotiation problems if he's injured for a while or if he wanted to fight in the first place because

it was all really weird how it came about uh i sort of got told about next minute they announced and next minute they they and i just didn't understand the whole situation so um i don't know that what's going on there. But I'm just going to keep doing what the UFC say. At the end of the day, the biggest fight and the one that makes the most sense, if that's the fight everyone wants to see, and we think the pay-per-views will do well, and legacy and all that type of stuff,

we'll make the decision for the right reasons. That's what counts. You're the champ, but why has Max... What does he do that the rest of the... Excluding yourself. What does he do that the rest of the division does not such that he also has this strong command? Put it this way.

If our division were doing their part and people were trying to take their number one spot and there was a clear... Say there was someone that took out top contenders, Max probably wouldn't get a trilogy straight away. But because these guys are sort of sitting back and I don't know, trying to pick their fights and things like that, he was the only one that went out there and took out the number one contenders

and cemented himself as the number one contender. That's why he was going to get the trilogy. And if the other contenders and cemented himself as the number one contender. That's why he was going to get the trilogy. And if the other contenders were doing that and there was a clear number one contender or even a clear number two or something, they'd probably be in front of Max. Everyone would be screaming their name. But the reason why Max is going to keep coming up is because he's still there. He actually did his part by going out there and fighting guys and keeping that number one spot.

So it's not like he's just being given, again, if he didn't fight anyone he wouldn't get this chance, but at least he went out there and took out the other guys and that's why people are still talking about him and that trilogy. So that's always going to be

there. And while this division sorts itself out, if they don't do their job, they're going to be sitting there waiting even longer. Wherever I move up, obviously I'm looking at this lightweight division and I've done my part now. You haven't heard me talk about lightweight division.

I've talked about it. People ask me about it, but I've never said, give me that fight. I've always said I plan on doing that in the near future. I want to wait for the right time. I'm the type of guy that you've got to earn the opportunity to do something like that.

I've had four title fights, four wins, three defenses. I'm in a position where I can start calling for this type of shit. So there you go. That's why I feel like that is definitely enough. No more free fights this year and I'm not going to sit there and wait for the division or just fight, you know, already had to fight someone that wasn't really next in line because of the injury, through injury and stuff like that. So I don't want to have to just do that again for the sake of it.

Give me a lightweight fight or something that still makes sense, and then maybe later if the division sorts itself out or the UFC come back with whoever it was, another number one contender or Max Holloway, whatever it is, we'll do that later in the year. But I want three fights this year, and I think next is a title fight in lightweight division. All right, let me give an alternative theory about why Max is there.

Yes, he took on Calvin Cater, he took on Pierre Rodriguez, but he's also better than them. He's better than them. I guess what I'm asking you is what does he do that's not enough for you, but that is enough for them? What makes him so good? Oh, he's a great fighter. That's why he's a champion again.

And obviously, if I wasn't here, he'd still be champion and he'd be reigning, you know, he would have a lot of defenses. But again, as I always say, right, it's different when I'm in front of you. But he's got a good game. He's a smart fighter. Obviously, he eats a lot of shots, like he'll eat some to give some. But I mean, there's still strategy around it as well. He's got a good team around him.'s obviously durable he's obviously fit so he covers a lot of ground

in them and then he does strategize as well volume fighter and um but the strategy uh behind it as well you know it isn't just like he just throws anything you know he's calculated in he's approaching the volume volume striking but again we've got reads on that and it's just different when i'm in front of you. I'm not going to let you just, you know, I don't let you just do your thing and roll on from there. I make people fight my fight, and that's that. Yeah, one thing on that, and we'll move on to 155, but you had mentioned that your style

covers a lot of ground, sort of speaking metaphorically. Yep. What do you mean exactly by that? You can wrestle, you can strike, you can do all that stuff, but when you say covers a lot of ground, how do you envision that okay so like uh you know a lot of guys that will have uh certain tools and things like that you know that could give me danger my style will nullify a lot of that purely from my style you know but these guys that say he's got a kicking heavy game or a right hand heavy game or uppercut heavy you know all these things

my style uh and you know how i approach a fight and you know and just yeah the type of fighter i am nulla can nullify a lot of people's like what's a good word a lot of their tools good tools i can nullify that with purely just just my style like i don't need a strategy to nullify this guy's um tough you know strong leg kick or whatever it is whatever it is you know what i'm saying or arrange this guy fights at you know i fight at a really good range that makes it difficult for a lot of different styles um you know my entries and fakes and all that as you would know you know i don't just i'm not easy to read you know and things like that so So counter fighters, I cover a lot of ground with counter fighters

because when am I coming in? You know what I mean by that. Guys that volume strikers, again, defensively and breaking the rim, my style covers a lot of that. You can have all these different styles and my style can deal with them just purely without even really having strategy. And then you can, on top of that, guys that might have tools that I need to have a bit more strategy and a bit more focus to nullify on, I can add that on top.

Does that make sense? It does make sense. You won't give me the specifics, which is fine, but it does. From broad strokes, it doesn't really make sense. Let me ask you this, though. You don't have to name names. I'm certainly not interested in anything like that. But what you do is so unique and so encompassing, it seems almost negligent that people aren't trying to copy you, right?

Our biggest sport here is the NFL. I don't know if you know this, but we call it a copycat league because all of the coordinators come up with offensive strategies, and they work for a season. Then everyone borrows them and they have to come up with something new. I don't see a lot of people following what you're doing, at least not very much. Why is that? Well, it ain't easy to do. Okay.

All right. That's a good way of putting it. A lot of people are trying to, I keep busy, right? I'm busy keeping other people's brain busy and all that and I'm always constantly changing things and mixing things up and all that while I'm fighting what's in front of me. It's not as easy to do. A lot of people can't do all them things at once. I can't do

outside of the cage, I can't do two things at once. I'm useless. Ask my wife. She'll tell you. But in the cage I can do multiple things at once. And that is, you know, me moving, obviously picking shots and, you know, and then doing fakes and all that type of stuff and keeping them busy and all that type of stuff. A lot of people can't do that.

It's easier said than done. Believe that, like, you know what I mean? But because without giving too much away i don't you know you people think they get a read on me and i'm changing it like that you know i mean i'm picking up that they're trying to you know pick up on something i'm doing and i'm constantly changing that while i'm still keeping them busy and capitalizing you get what i mean there's a it's very complex it's a lot of layers there and And it ain't just a very odd. People see me do a lot of low kicks and it's me just throwing low kicks. There's a lot of purpose in every

little low kick that I do. There's different ranges, there's different speeds, there's different powers in them. It goes a lot deeper than what most people think. The details that we go into, I had them details through the whole game. And that's how I learned. You play chess, and some people just like to play with their queens and bishops and tassels. And I use every piece on that board. And I use them all effectively. You might use pawns more than anything else. There you go.

I'm more than happy to use the pawns to set up the queens and things like that, where a lot of people are just, you know, they're just offense heavy. You know what I mean? My pawns are going to maybe protect the king and queen and all that and then kick off some of these guys as we go out. And then the queen can come out and take out when they're ready, you know? I know your time is limited, so I'll make this quick. But I guess the thing I would say is it just blows my mind

that we have a champion who's doing what you're doing and you know Max is a talented fighter as well he's got his own thing but like we're still in a world where like I'll watch UFC fights and you'll see a lot of guys not even faint and it's like how can there be that like I if you had a lesson for young fighters young fighters not experienced guys in the UFC young fighters what would it be what's the number one thing to make sure that they position themselves for the next evolution in fighting and to be there ready for it? Man, I can't give too much away again, right? Just one singular insight.

Man, it's just one thing that I still don't get is a lot of gyms, how they separate all the martial arts. They'll go there and if they want to do boxing, they'll go to a boxing gym and just do boxing. Boxing is obviously great to do, but MMA is totally different. You need to blend them all together. You need to have an MMA approach in boxing, MMA approach in kickboxing, MMA approach in wrestling, MMA approach in jiu-jitsu. Don't separate them. I see people separating them all the time. They sit there, they want to in jiu-jitsu. Don't separate them. I see people separating them all the time. Like they sit there, they want to do jiu-jitsu, they go to a jiu-jitsu guy,

they'll chuck on a gi. I love jiu-jitsu. I'm a black belt, I love jiu-jitsu. But when it comes to mixed martial arts, you know what I mean, I am very MMA specific with my jiu-jitsu approach. And the team around me all understand that. So we've got a jiu-jitsu coach and everything is just MMA specific with my Jiu Jitsu approach. The team around me all understand that. We've got a Jiu Jitsu coach and everything is just MMA specific. I think that

obviously some gyms do that, but you would be surprised at how many gyms don't. Before we go here, 155. I guess my question would be, if they come to you at 155 and they say we've got an idea for you. Are you only accepting a title shot or number one contender? Because here's my idea.

There's a lot of different ways to do it. A lot of guys go and get the title fights. But sometimes, like Anderson Silva, they go up and take on someone who's highly ranked, but the style makes for the fight itself. Not the James Irvin one, but Forrest Griffin would be one. Here's a similar idea. See, I'm just going to pitch it to you. See what you think.

If they don't come to you with a title shot for whatever reason, it's busy or someone's injured or whatever, and they say, how about RDA? Rafael dos Anjos. What do you say? I think, again, I want this title fight. I called for it because I think I earned it. We're seeing guys

get the chance at a second title for much less than what I've done. I don't think I'll waste get the chance at a second title for much less than what I've done. You know what I mean? So I don't think I'd waste my time unless it is for the belt. You know what I mean? So that's a position. Obviously, I'll talk to my team and see what they think.

But I mean, when you're doing stuff like that as well, then you're taking pay cuts for that, right? It ain't even a title fight anymore. So it just doesn't make sense. And I think I'm in a position where I can definitely at least ask for that. And if not, if it's not this fight, maybe next fight. But I believe I'm in a good position and I don't think I need to try and climb the ladder

where I'm at. I'm undefeated a lot of weight too, remember that. I'm undefeated a little weight. You're undefeated at heavyweight, welterweight, all different kinds of weight. Last question, two-parter before you go. One, I know that you had said you wanted to go back to Australia. Dana White was kind of like, eh. But it is opened up.

Kambosis is going back there with the Devin Haney fight and a whole lot of stuff. So did you have any conversations subsequent to that with Dana? And two, again, Israel Adesanya was like, if you come to New Zealand, you come to Auckland, I'll show you the works. If I make the trip to Australia, no more I don't want to say enough, no more I can't tell you anything. Would you show me some of the complexities off the record of your game? I don't know, man.

You get a lot of it out there, you know what I mean? I don't know. I definitely would show you some cool shit, but I mean, you're a clever man. We could have some good conversations, I reckon. I'll take that as a yes. We could take a lot from each other.

I'll take that as a yes. But I mean, yeah, not all the tricks. Not all the tricks. Not all the tricks. All right, did you talk to the UFC? Enough that's going to get my opponents in more trouble. Right, okay, fair enough. You know what I mean?

Fair enough. So I've got another step ahead. You can show me the old stuff. Maybe you can save all the new stuff. I'll let them level up just so I can counter with another level on top of that. And then anything with Australia? Australia, no, look, we're having a, I think there's a bit of confusion there. We'll have a conversation

because I don't think there's that many hurdles to cross. Not any more than you would have going to London or anything like that. No more quarantine. You know what I mean?

No, exactly. So I feel, maybe there was a little bit of miscommunication with something that he heard but I reckon we'll get over line. Well, I'm going to at least try and push for it.

Again, I think the Aussie fans, he knows how big it is over there, and he loves going there. I think they deserve it, the Aussie fans, and I think maybe I deserve to defend my belt as well. So hopefully we can get that over the line. Well, I've got to say, this might be the golden era of combat sports in Australia, the Oceanic region right now.

You and Kambosis and Adesanya and everyone else, you guys are at the front of it, so it's an exciting time. There he is. He's the featherweight champion of the world and he might be for a long time to come. Alex Volkanovski, thank you for your time. Thank you, I appreciate it.