Anthony Smith made it clear that ranking and numbers are not an issue for him in accepting opponents.
Last month, Azamat Murzakanov backed out of his fight against Khalil Rountree after the former caught pneumonia. The bout between the two was originally scheduled for December 2 at Moody Center in Austin, Texas. The duo was supposed to join the event featuring the bouts between Beneil Dariush and Arman Tsarukyan and Bobby Green and Jalin Turner. However, UFC CEO Dana White announced the withdrawal of Murzakanov and said that Smith would be replacing the fighter. In line with that, the bout was moved to a week later at UFC Fight Night 233 on December 9.
Surprisingly, despite having the offer on short notice, it was accepted by Smith, who stressed that he loves taking on challenging tasks, including attaining the required weight for the bout at a limited time.
“I like doing crazy sh*t,” Smith said at a pre-fight news conference this Wednesday. “Taking a fight with Khalil Rountree on like 10 days’ notice is pretty crazy.”
Smith will enter the cage with a recent rematch victory over Ryan Spann in August after experiencing defeat from Johnny Walker and Magomed Ankalaev earlier. However, Rountree could be a tough fight, which is evident in his current four-winning streak. With this, some view Smith’s decision to take the fight as a risk, especially if he would lose to a fighter at a much lower rank than him. The No. 8-ranked fighter, nonetheless, dismisses the relevance of ranking in taking any fight.
“The rankings are for people on Twitter and you guys,” Smith explained. “We don’t really pay attention to that too much. To be honest, the UFC doesn’t really pay that much attention to it either. Rankings are like a marketing machine. It’s really easy to make people care about something more when there are numbers next to their names.
“The UFC understands how tough of a position I put myself in and how hard it is to come in on short notice and beat a guy like Khalil. And it’s even harder to look good doing it. So if you come in and you put yourself in these precarious positions and do hard things, I think you get rewarded for that.”
