Gegard Mousasi with his DREAM belts.
By Dann Stupp, mmajunkie.com:
Soon after his dominant victory over Mark Hunt in the open-weight "Super Hulk" tournament at Tuesday's DREAM.8 event, Gegard Mousasi said he was scheduled to fight former UFC champ Vitor Belfort at Affliction III.
Mousasi, who recently vacated his DREAM middleweight title to move up a weight class, assumed the fight would take place at light heavyweight.
However, after Belfort told Tatame.com that he would only fight at middleweight and questioned the starpower of his potential opponent, Mousasi has now issued a challenge: fight at a catch-weight.
Affliction III is expected to take place Aug. 1 at the Honda Center in Anaheim, Calif. The Mousasi vs. Belfort bout would have been a solid addition to a fight card headlined by Fedor Emelianenko vs. Josh Barnett. However, Mousasi said he can't take the fight at 185 pounds.
"I cannot make the weight," Mousasi told M-1Global.com. "Otherwise I would have continued to fight at 185 and not given up my DREAM middleweight title. I cannot make 185 anymore, and that is final."
Mousasi (25-2-1), a former PRIDE fighter and winner of the 2008 DREAM middleweight grand prix, has now won 12 consecutive fights over the likes of Hector Lombard, Denis Kang, Evangelista "Cyborg" Santos, Melvin Manhoef and Ronaldo Souza. Ten of the 12 wins have come via stoppage, and Mousasi has quickly shot up the middleweight rankings and now appears in most top fives.
That's why he was surprised to hear Belfort (18-8) question the marketability of the fight and Mousasi's star power.
"To be honest, I don't really care," Mousasi sais. "But for me, his comments are strange because his paycheck will be unchanged whether he fights a bigger name than me or not. It is also strange that he does not see me as a challenge when many rankings have me ranked higher than him at middleweight."
So, that led to the challenge.
"If (Belfort) does not want to fight at middleweight, why not fight me at a catchweight?" he said.
Mousasi didn't mention a specific weight, though 195 pounds would seem the most logical. And it's unknown of Belfort will agree to the catch-weight fight.
MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) could not immediately reach officials from Affliction for comment.
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