BOSTON – For as much as Brad Tavares respects former UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman, the fact of the matter is that they were locked inside a cage Saturday night.
And for all 15 minutes of their UFC 292 encounter, Tavares (20-8 MMA, 15-8 UFC) had no reservations about attacking Weidman’s surgically repaired leg with kicks as he won a clean-sweep unanimous decision in their featured prelim.
“At the end of the day, I don’t think he’ll feel bad, in the moment, trying to break my leg,” Tavares told reporters, including MMA Junkie, backstage at TD Garden. “Obviously that’s not what I wanted to see happen, but that is the intent behind it. When I am kicking somebody, it’s bad intentions. I do want to hurt them. This is fighting.”
