UFC welterweight star Khamzat Chimaev has given a damning assessment of fellow contender Gilbert Burns‘ title hopes.
After tearing through his competition en route to a place in the 170-pound rankings, Chimaev’s fast ascension took a significant step up in competition in the form of one-time title challenger Burns, who was coming off a victory over perennial top-10 Stephen Thompson.
At UFC 273, the pair went to war for three rounds. After, according to his coach, abandoning the game plan, “Borz” threw heavy leather with his Brazilian counterpart, taking damage for the first time in his Octagon career.
The Chechen-born Swede ultimately passed the difficult test, securing his place in the top five and close to Kamaru Usman’s gold with a unanimous decision victory in Jacksonville.
But despite being given his toughest outing to date by Burns, Chimaev has since come to a less than positive conclusion for the Brazilian’s career trajectory.
Chimaev: Burns Was Happy In Defeat
During a recent appearance on The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani, Chimaev spoke about the immediate aftermath of the memorable UFC 273 contest.
Among other points, Burns repeatedly called for a rematch, suggested that he could have had his hand raised with a further two rounds, and pointed out stats such as the significant strikes that “Borz” ate compared to his previous four bouts under the UFC banner.
Having come to the conclusion that “Durinho” was happy despite falling to defeat on April 9, Chimaev claimed that the Brazilian will “never” become a UFC champion with that attitude.
“The guy (Burns), I make him famous. The guy was a nobody, you know, before me,” Chimaev said. “I make him famous. And he lost the fight, (but) he was more happy. I was angry for that fight. I win that fight, (but) I was angry because I didn’t finish that guy. I don’t understand (why) some guys like Gilbert become happy when they lost the fight.
“Going everywhere, doing interviews, and (saying), ‘I’m gonna fight with him again.’ Yeah, we’re gonna fight, whatever, I’ll fight with him whenever he wants, but I don’t see he will be champ, because if you’re happy when you lost the fight, you will never be champ. I win my fight, I was like, one month angry at me in training and everything,” Chimaev added. “These things I don’t understand.”
While Chimaev will be focusing on his own championship ambitions soon enough — after a detour to face Nate Diaz in the UFC 279 headliner — Burns will be looking to prove “Borz” wrong by making his way back to the title in his next outings. If he does so, perhaps a second chapter of Chimaev vs. Burns isn’t out of the question.
I think Burns peaked in that fight with Hazmat. Kinda like Gustafson peaked in his 1st fight with Jones.
I think Hazmat peaked in that fight too. Diaz is going to eat everything thrown at him and win in the championship rounds
Chimaev will fold Diaz in half, backwards, sit on him and smack him into submission.
Maybe, maybe not
Chimaev will pick Diaz up by an ankle, helicopter swing him around the ring while laughing and toss him into the crowd.
Burns might never be champion but will always get respect and my dollars for PPV fight he is in. The guy is a fucking warrior
As for khamzat guy is talking a whole lot of shit for someone fighting semi retired LW Nate Diaz. Just STFU or fight someone ranked your own size that can wrestle homie
I just watched this fight in full for the first time. That was a razor close fight. But for the jab dropping Burns in the first, I think Burns won the fight. Chimaev is human. He may have lost some memories with that right hook Burns landed on him.
Burns can’t beat Usman, Colby or Khamzat. That’s why he can’t be champion
Burns v. Leon would be a good fight though and tbh I’d pick Gilbert to win
No one wants to fight him lol
Colby might actually have to like beat Burns first. Burns hits harder than him and may take away his TD threat since Colby may not want to go down to the ground with him just like Usman and Khamzat didn’t. So that’s major unproven leap u b making.
I hold Colby in very high regard. I believe he would take him down and control him doing mid damage. Enough to not get stood up and enough to make burns not able to get up
I think Colby does the same like he did Maia, a not so pretty wall n stall
Ur entitled to ur opinion. Until it happens it’s just that. Let’s see Colby actually fight him first eh?
For the record, I think Colby could win if he weathers the early storm but Gilbert could get the better of him due to the reasons stated too. Colby also doesn’t do “mid” damage on the ground, he does very mild damage and if Usman and Khamzat didn’t wanna mess around with Gilbert on the ground, I would be impressed if Colby actually did and got the better. But that hasn’t happened yet. Colby is trying to fight Dustin instead.
Burns kinda hits harder than Maia tho.
Also rewatching Khamzat Burns, I thought Khamzat did better than I did live. Sure he will need to fight smarter down the road but he will given that was his first elite level experience and he was still pretty composed none the less.
There was quite a size diff tho and Burns also brawled himself out. Great win for Khamzat. Very impressive how Burns was able to neutralize Khamzat’s tds and have Khamzat back out when he got Burns down as well.
Its an interesting fight for sure