VIDEO | Dominick Cruz wants TJ Dillashaw Next: “Stop looking for little baby boys at 125”

“I think that should be my next fight [TJ Dillashaw]. But…they(the UFC) play weird games where, they want to give TJ Dillashaw a little bit of an easier fight because he doesn’t want to fight somebody hard right after he won the title, he wants the easy fight. He wants to fight someone that he knows he can keep the belt a little longer before he gets a really hard fight. Whereas I go TJ Dillashaw, Urijah Faber, Cody Garbrandt and then I lose the belt.

Let’s go, TJ, like I beat you, don’t you want to get that back? Stop going down and looking for little baby boys at 125. “Silly Dilly” is what I call him.

That’s the fight that matters. Everyone wants to see if he can beat me and everybody knows I can beat him. Why wouldn’t we see that again? I just don’t understand why it would go any other way. 

I definitely don’t hate TJ Dillashaw or any of these guys. It’s just silly to me [the game]. Like, if I lost to somebody and I was the champion, i’d want that fight right away. I want to get my loss back from Cody but he lost and I want the guy who’s the champion. I get the belt back from beating TJ then I give Cody a shot. That’s the way it should be because I lost to Cody so let’s see if I made the adjustments.”

By now, if you don’t know the history and story of Dominick Cruz then you’ve missed out. After multiple what would be for most, career-ending injuries and being stripped of his title, Dominick Cruz would return to the octagon in the beginning of 2016 to take on the new champ, TJ Dillashaw. Cruz would pull off the comeback and get back the belt he never lost.

A simply miraculous feat for Cruz to fight again let alone win back his title.

After fighting twice more following the epic Dillashaw fight and losing the third and last fight of 2016 to Cody Garbrandt, Cruz would take off all 2017. That wasn’t quite the whole plan though as Cruz was matched with fellow top 5 bantamweight, Jimmie Rivera for UFC 219 at the end of the year but was forced out of the bout after breaking his arm.

“That’s the one thing that would turn it off, does TJ want to fight while my arm heals? Timing. My arm is pretty good. I have, I don’t know, a limited amount of time and the doctor clears me to punch. I’m already cleared to exercise. I’m already exercising, I just can’t punch with it yet.”

So are you down for the Cruz vs Dillashaw rematch? Who do you want to see the former two-time champion fight against in his return if not Dillashaw?

This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 2/7/2018.