Dustin Poirier catches up with with UFC’s McKenzie Pavacich backstage to talk about his KO victory over France’s Benoit Saint …
well Dustin congratulations we spoke a lot this week about how you’ve never lost to back toback you said you had absolutely no plans of letting that happen this weekend how you feeling feels good to get a finish feels good to write the ship get back in the wind colum in UFC on my 30th fight here uh in the octagon and to be a young hungry guy who was on a streak you know that’s it’s it just feels good a lot of hard work went into this earlier you said I think I don’t want to misquote you but I’m pretty sure you said something along the lines of throw me Into the Fire why was Ben wais the fire in this case cuz the Top’s kind of stalled up right now guys have fights coming up there’s nothing happening um there wasn’t any other big names at the top that I could fight right now at 55 and they have this guy representing France who’s on a five fight win streak making a lot of noise has a big Following over there in Europe so it just made sense young hungry guy 20 something years old I’m an 35 30 fights in the UFC let me see if I still got it and indeed I do 30 fights in the Octagon is an invaluable amount of experience how much did you feel experience both in and out of the Octagon really played in your favor this time fight week was great and smooth especially being here in Florida where I train but just the nerves you know they’re they’re always there because I’m about to fight another man in front of the world so the nerves are always there but it just feel at home all these faces back here behind the scenes that nobody nobody really gets to see I’ve been with these guys since I was 21 years old so it’s kind of like I just feel like I belong here and to get to fight for the first time in South Florida I can’t believe you’ve never had the opportunity so to get to fight in front of a semi home crowd like you said just a really short flight from Louisiana what sort of emotions were you feeling in the Octagon it felt great it was kind of rough like not emotion wise but just a little surprised he he wasn’t a very big puncher but he’s very strong he was a big 55 I wonder what he weighed tonight he felt really solid um and his grappling skills were decent you know I was like I’m I’m sitting here losing rounds to this this kid ALS also he didn’t he didn’t take me down I took myself down jumping Guillotines and I’ll do it again damn it I was going to say we heard the corner advice and they said no more guilles and then you just immediately did it and against the fence when I had the high elbow Mike said don’t do it right after he just told me in the corner and I was like you know what I’m doing it should have stuck your tongue out it was it was an executive decision well I think it played in your favor but walk me through the Finish if you can remember it I think he dipped down and throw an overhand and I caught him uh split his timing with an up cut and his legs kind of went but then he came back up and when he came up he was loose chin up and hands down trying to hurt me and this we practice it in the back I know UFC has the footage cuz the camera was back there we were practicing catch catch fire the hook catch catch fire the hook cuz he fought my buddy Thiago Moises and uh when he got Moises against the fence he starts throwing these combinations from the hip gunslinging and his chins in the air he’s a he he’s a decent puncher and a big guy but he throws everything into every shot with not the best technique you know that’ll come he’s still young he’s still working but we saw a lot of openings and I really felt that right hook was going to be there and boy was it well there’s only three people ahead of you in terms of most wins in UFC history any weight when you think of believe it’s Jim Miller has three or four more wins when you think of cementing yourself in a history book something like that just adding to your legacy do the wins mean anything of course they do you know I think one that really means a lot to me right now is I’m in UFC history with most fight of the nights kids are getting like when I first started in the UFC it was kind of a little bit of an older Fighters you know there wasn’t a lot of young kids 21 22 23 now the Sport’s grown so much that kids are doing it at an early age so they’re getting into the UFC earlier so a lot of those longevity records are going to be broken they’re going to be hard to keep but fight of the night having the most of those not in not in lightweight division in the UFC history that’s going to be a tough one to break and I’m tied right now and I really want to I really want that first place J fight of the night or all performance bonuses combin I have a lot of I have some other I have a bunch of other performance bonuses but fight of the night who wants to get in there and get gritty and have the record for that you know it’s tough to do I think that’s one that’ll stick longer than a lot of these other longevity records well the fight didn’t go the distance I I would say and I don’t really have an opinion on this that matters but definitely fight of the night in my book when you think of what’s next for you what comes to mind my goal with the good fight Foundation raising 50k for food net when I get home auctioning off these gloves and shorts I water the oct on tonight giving back to the community getting and getting getting back to my daughter and being a dad you know training Camp’s hectic she’s in school in second grade so she can’t come to South Florida with me the whole time she I only seen her for two weeks in the last seven or eight weeks so you know that hurts I love my little girl and I promise her a date when I get home so that’s what I’m going to do what kind of date are you taking her on taking her to trampoline park then we’re going to go get ice cream then I’m going to take her to toy store it’s going to and she wants to go in my my Corvette so it’s going to be it’s going to be fun that’s a day you have earned it Dustin congratulations thank you so much