Max Holloway views Alexander Volkanovski as a safe bet over Ilia Topuria.
Volkanovski (26-3 MMA, 13-2 UFC) defends his featherweight title against Topuria (14-0 MMA, 6-0 UFC) in the UFC 298 main event Feb. 17 at Honda Center in Anaheim, Calif.
Having lost to Volkanovski three times in title fights, Holloway finds it hard to pick against the champion – even though he’s coming off a knockout loss to lightweight champion Islam Makhachev in October.
“As long as Volk has the healthiest training camp, a great training camp, he doesn’t get hurt in his training camp, it’s hard to bet against Volk,” Holloway told Kevin Iole. “But you never know. It’s MMA, Topuria’s a young dude, so we’ll see what happens. A lot of people are counting Volk out because of his last fight.
“The only reason he could get affected is if he gets hurt in camp, but I think the coaching staff, Eugene (Bareman), everyone around there are too smart to let Volk go in there hurt. If I was a betting man, how do you bet against Volk? But we’ve seen more wild stuff happen in MMA.”
Topuria is oozing confidence ahead of his first crack at gold. The unbeaten rising star even updated his social media biography to UFC champion, but Holloway says sometimes you need that kind of confidence to achieve greatness.
“The confidence is the confidence you need, man,” Holloway said. “If you don’t have that confidence, you’re not down to be great. Some people think it’s weird, some people think it’s wild. Some people have that kind of confidence behind closed doors, and some people have that kind of confidence on social media.
“At the end of the day, it is what it is. I’m not going to throw nothing at the guy if that’s the confidence he needs to go there and that’s the confidence you need to be in a world championship fight, to work hard, to get to this point. It means a lot, and if that’s what it takes for you to get there then that’s what it takes.”
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 298.
