Karl
Williams uniquely challenged Stipe
Miocic to a cookout following his victory over Justin Tafa
at UFC
on ESPN 53.
Advertisement
Williams dominated Tafa on the ground for three rounds to cruise to
a unanimous decision win on Saturday. Williams used his Octagon
interview to issue a one-of-a-kind challenge to former heavyweight
champ Stipe
Miocic for a barbecue cookout.
“I wanna call out if I can, Stipe Miocic. He works at the firehouse
and he said he’s gonna be barbecuing,” Williams said. “He’s working
on learning how to barbecue, so this summer let’s do a charity
cookout if he’s not busy, you know. He’s an important man. But if
you got some time, your firehouse against me and my crew at a
charity barbecue [to] help firefighters. So that’s my biggest
thing.”
A barbecue enthusiast himself, Williams later explained that the
idea of a cookout occurred to him when Miocic got talking about
barbecuing with his team of firefighters. Williams had a
firefighter neighbor who was injured on the job, inspiring a
potential charity cookout event for firefighters. Williams also
extended his callout to all UFC fighters, including Alexander
Volkanovski, whose cooking style he admittedly doesn’t
like.
“I talked to Stipe a while ago and he was telling me about the
firehouse,” Williams said at his post-fight press conference (video
via MMAjunkie.com). “I had a neighbor – we ended up moving
neighborhoods – but I had a neighbor, he was a firefighter, got
injured on the job cleaning the fire truck. And you know Stipe’s a
firefighter and also at the [UFC Performance Institute] he was
talking about learning how to barbecue and how all the guys at his
firehouse barbecues and different stuff. So I was like, you know
what, it’ll be a good charity for his cause.
“Anybody in the UFC… I don’t call people out for fights and stuff
but barbecuing on a fence building, I’m calling you out. So anybody
wanna challenge me in the barbecue, I see Volk out there cooking
steaks, I don’t like how he’s cooking but anybody want a barbecue,
we’ll do a challenge out here, International Fight Week or
something, set up the grill, have the people decide. I’m just here
to fight and have fun and cook.”
While Williams used to prefer barbecuing with sauce in his younger
days, he now prefers a rub. Williams also has to be careful with
his drinking-to-barbecuing ratio as he risks downing a 24-pack of
beer if he is doing a brisket.
“I was a sauce guy when I was young and immature, but now that I’m
grown and sophisticated, I’m more of a rub guy,” he said.
“My go-to, I do pork belly bites, then I do my ribs, for the
cookouts for people I do leg quarters, cook some steaks. I haven’t
had the time to do a brisket. I gotta get my drinking-to-cooking
ratio down set. Because right now I’m only on the ribs portion of
the levelling it out. So if I start doing brisket, I don’t know
it’s gonna turn out to a 12-pack or 24-pack.”