Kelvin Gastelum Won’t Respect Vitor Belfort In The Cage

Kelvin Gastelum made a successful return to middleweight this past December, scoring an impressive TKO victory over Tim Kennedy at UFC 206 in Toronto, Canada.

Now, the former The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) winner is gearing up for a pivotal bout with a legendary former champion, as he’s set to meet Vitor Belfort in the main event of this weekend’s (March 11, 2017) UFC Fight Night 106 from Brazil.

“The Phenom” has lost three out of his last four bouts, with all three of those losses coming by way of stoppage at the hands of Chris Weidman, Ronaldo Souza and Gegard Mousasi. Gastelum, however, is still expecting the ‘best’ version of the Brazilian knockout artist:

“I prepared for the best Vitor,” Gastelum told MMAjunkie. “I know he’s coming off two losses. I know nobody wants to lose three times in a row, so he’s kind of got his back up against the wall in this fight.

“I feel like whenever somebody has their back up against the wall, that’s when they react the hardest and react the quickest, so I expect the best version of Vitor on Saturday.”

The 25-year-old Gastelum acknowledges that he has a big fight in front of him, and although he admits that he respects the 39-year-old Belfort, he also said that the respect will be gone once the cage door closes:

“For sure, this is a big deal for me,” Gastelum said. “It’s a big deal to fight a guy like Vitor. I know how much of a big deal he is, and I give him the respect that he deserves, but once that cage door closes, that respect is gone for 25 minutes.

“I’m very confident in my abilities to strike with him, too. So for sure I’m looking to get a knockout, but also I’m not going to be dumb to where I’m going to play just his game. We’re going to do MMA. This is MMA, so we’ll do MMA.”

Do you expect Gastelum to continue his momentum against Belfort?