Brian
Ortega doesn’t think his fight against Diego Lopes
will go the distance.
Advertisement
Ortega was preparing for a move to lightweight when he accepted a
featherweight booking against Lopes on two weeks’ notice at
UFC
303 this past June. When Ortega faced trouble cutting weight,
Lopes accepted the fight at lightweight. However, Ortega had to
pull out on fight night.
In an unprecedented turn of events, Dan Ige
replaced Lopes on four hours’ notice at a catchweight of 165
pounds, dropping an entertaining unanimous decision. Ortega has
since expressed his admiration for both Ige and Lopes for agreeing
to fight on four hours’ notice.
Ortega’s booking against Lopes has been remade for UFC
306, which goes down at the Sphere in Las Vegas on Saturday.
Ortega notes that they are both evenly matched on the ground as
well as on the feet to an extent that he is almost fighting a
slightly different version of himself.
O’Malley vs. Dvalishvili Saturday at 10 ET on ESPN+. Order
Now!
“You have someone who refuses to lose [on the ground] and refuses
to lose in the stand up,” Ortega told Submission Radio. “So when I
say that, I bet you have no idea who I’m talking about. That’s why
this is a exciting fight. You get to fight almost like a version of
yourself. Tad bit different styles, same mentality.”
Ortega is also confident that someone will get finished in the
fight. Boasting seven finishes in his eight UFC wins, Ortega knows
someone is going out on their shield, and he doesn’t plan on doing
so.
“Someone is gonna get finished. Guaranteed,” Ortega said. “You know
me, you’ve seen me. I either put you on your shield or you put me
on mine. I’m not going out on my shield.”
Ortega is coming off a submission win over Yair
Rodriguez that saw him rebound from a two-fight slump in his
return to action after a two-year hiatus this past February.
Meanwhile, Lopes has mounted a four-fight winning streak — with
three first round finishes — after coming up on the short side of a
decision in his “Fight of the Night” UFC debut against Movsar
Evloev.