While the match-up feels somewhat random, Ruffy is certainly taking it seriously. He sees it as an opportunity to jump from the bottom of the Top 10 (No. 7, according to the Media Panel Rankings and No. 10 according to the Meta Rankings) right into a title shot.
“Winning this fight takes us straight to the title,” Ruffy declared in a new social media post. “I don’t feel pressure at all. I feel privileged, very grateful to God for this. I’m going there for the knockout, I don’t want to leave the octagon without that result. If it’s not that, so be it, but I’m 100 percent committed to it.”
Ruffy built up his career as part of the Fighting Nerds, but announced back in May that he was no longer with the team. He now trains with Alexander Volkanovski and Joe Lopez at Freestyle MMA (details here).
“I’m going to Australia to do the full camp there,” Ruffy said. “I’ll be offline, I won’t be responding much here, I’ll just be focused on training.”
Spending the next six weeks in Australia with Volkanovski will undoubtedly help, but will it help enough?