Manager: Rose Namajunas Still In Talks Over Title Fight With Weili Zhang
Rose Namajunas is still in talks to fight Weili Zhang according to manager Brian Butler.
Namajunas — coming off an impressive win over Jessica Andrade — was expected to be the next challenger for Zhang’s strawweight crown. However, UFC president Dana White recently claimed Namajunas didn’t want the fight which could lead to Carla Esparza getting the next shot.
Namajunas as well as her coach and fiance Pat Barry have since denied White’s claims but it still isn’t clear what exactly is causing friction in the negotiations.
As far as Butler is concerned, talks are still ongoing. However, representing all three fighters, he also revealed that Esparza is in the mix.
“We’re still in talks with the UFC about Rose, but I can tell you that Rose is ready,” Butler told MMA Junkie. “Rose has been ready. She’s been ready, she’s been in camp. Rose is ready to fight, honestly, in the next – she can fight on a couple of weeks’ notice. She’s ready to go.
“So we have to see. It could be Rose, it could be Carla, it could be whoever. We’ll see.”
As for Zhang, she hasn’t competed since her split decision war with Joanna Jedrzejczyk at UFC 248 in March last year. However, she has been ready to compete for a while as well and was hoping to do so in Fight Island this month only for the cards to fill up too quick.
And given what she had to endure last year due to COVID-19 restrictions, “Magnum” isn’t particularly keen on competing in the United States anytime soon.
“Weili has been ready to go for some time now,” Butler said. “The only hesitancy is – her last fight, I don’t know if everybody knows the full details on everything that happened. But for her to even get to that fight was trails and trails just to get there. To avoid the COVID, they flew her to Thailand. Then Thailand started to lock down, so they flew her to Abu Dhabi. She was traveling for the last third of that camp.
“She was flying all around the world just to kind of escape getting locked into a country, and then finally gets to Vegas, puts on the performance that she does, and then she’s stuck in Vegas for several months after the fight because she can’t go home. And then when she finally does get home, she has to basically get locked up again for another month. She has been a little bit paranoid to come back Stateside right now until things have calmed down.”
Hopefully, we get to see Zhang vs. Namajunas soon as that’s the fight most fans want to see.
Do you think we’ll see Zhang take on Namajunas next?
