Anthony Pettis accepts Jose Aldo’s challenge

There was once a time in the MMA history books where Jose Aldo vs Anthony Pettis was a fantasy fight being made into reality. However, it wasn’t meant to be. But could 2019 be the year for it…?

Both Pettis and Aldo are former WEC and UFC champions thus making them rather historic figures. At a time, they were about as good as it gets when it came to MMA strikers.

Today they are both still very talented competitors who hang around the tops of their respective divisions. But as Aldo’s career winds down, he recently made it clear that he would still like to have that fight with Pettis that never ended up happening.

After seeing the comments made from Aldo, ‘Showtime’ shared his response.

“I accept! I love Brazil 🇧🇷 gonna be a fun year !! #teampettis” Pettis’ Instagram post read.

Aldo and Pettis were originally supposed to meet in the main event of UFC 163 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on August 3, 2013, for a champion vs champion clash at featherweight.

Unfortunately for Pettis, he would suffer a knee injury that forced him from the bout which brought in ‘The Korean Zombie’ Chan Sung Jung to take his place. Aldo would go on to win via fourth-round TKO.

Fast forward to the present and both have some pretty tough challenges directly ahead of them.

For Aldo, he will be facing the rising contender Renato ‘Moicano’ Carneiro in the UFC Fortaleza co-main event tomorrow night on ESPN+.

In Pettis’ next bout he will actually be moving up in weight to take on Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson in a welterweight main event at UFC Nashville on March 23.

Perhaps the proposed May time frame from Aldo could work out perfectly for the two to meet at lightweight at UFC 237 in Brazil on the 11th. Only time will tell.

This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 2/1/2019