Cory Sandhagen open to fighting Dominick Cruz or Frankie Edgar at a later date

UFC bantamweight contender Cory Sandhagen was given a rough go this week when his opponent Frankie Edgar was booked for a fight against Chan Sung Jung at UFC South Korea.

The No. 3-ranked bantamweight on the UFC roster, Sandhagen is scheduled to fight Edgar at UFC Raleigh in January. However, when Brian Ortega announced he was injured and forced to pull out of his fight against Jung, the UFC called upon Edgar to fill the void. That leaves Sandhagen in a tough predicament of not knowing what’s next for him.

Though Edgar is technically still booked to fight Sandhagen in Raleigh, it seems unlikely that Edgar could fight “The Korean Zombie” for five rounds and then turn around and fight Sandhagen four weeks later at a lower weight class. Sandhagen is fully aware that he may be pulled from the card now.

Speaking to MMAjunkie.com, Sandhagen said that he’s open to fighting Edgar at a later date, but he also says he’s interested in fighting for UFC bantamweight kingpin Dominick Cruz instead.

Here’s what Sandhagen said.

“I think I’ve kind of earned my spot in being able to be like, there’s a couple of guys who I want to fight. (No. 2-ranked bantamweight) Aljamain Sterling’s out right now so I’m not even going to bother calling Aljamain out because he just had surgery so it doesn’t make any sense,” Sandhagen said.

“In my head, it’s gotta be either Frankie or Cruz. I think that’s what I’ve earned at this point, taking tough fights. So that’s what I feel like I’ve earned. If it’s Frankie at a later date, okay. If it’s Cruz at a later date, okay. It doesn’t matter to me, that’s just what I would like.”

Though Sandhagen is still set to fight at Raleigh, he admits it seems unlikely he’ll be competing on that card next month. At this point, it seems far more likely that Sandhagen will be removed from the card and re-booked for a later date.

“I’m not sure. I just can’t imagine a scenario where Frankie is going to come out (of the Jung fight) unscathed and I don’t want to be holding my breath for that amount of time, so I don’t know. We’ll work it out with the agent, but I don’t know,” Sandhagen said.

Would you be more interested in seeing Cory Sandhagen fight Dominick Cruz or Frankie Edgar next?