Despite falling short on two attempts at claiming the UFC featherweight title, Brian Ortega is still very much in the mix at the top of the division.
“T-City” currently occupies the #3-ranking spot at 145 pounds following his win over Yair Rodríguez last time out in Mexico City.
He’s now set to return at UFC 306 where a win over rising star Diego Lopes could set him up for a third chance at winning the gold.
The featherweight belt is set to be defended next month at UFC 308 in one of the most anticipated fights of the year between the champion Ilia Topuria and the former titleholder, Max Holloway.
Though Ortega is excited to watch that one play out, he doesn’t have a prediction for who takes the victory in Abu Dhabi.
Brian Ortega Says He Doesn’t Take Either Topuria Or Holloway For Granted After Being Proven Wrong
The way that Ortega sees it, giving a prediction for the main event of UFC 308 would be counting out one man and that’s not something he is prepared to do.
He was asked if he had a pick for the fight during a recent interview with Submission Radio where he responded by saying that he isn’t sure who will claim the victory.
Having faced Holloway back in 2018 and been very impressed with Topuria’s title-winning performance against Alexander Volkanovski, he’s remaining on the fence for this one.
“I don’t know man… and I’m not even trying to be political, I have no idea. Topuria is someone who surprised me obviously last time so I learned very quickly not to say or go against him, lesson learned. Max is another guy that you don’t want to go against, lesson learned. Then when you look at the styles, you have Topuria who has more of a traditional boxer style, you have Max with his just a machine of punches and then unorthodox boxing style but it’s very effective.”