Glover Teixeira will be competing against Jared Cannonier at UFC 208, it will be the first fight for Teixeira since suffering a 13 second knockout loss to Anthony Johnson at UFC 202.
Teixeira, who has been in the MMA spotlight for awhile now, is happy to give Cannonier a shot in the spotlight as well. The #15 ranked Cannonier has a prime opportunity to make a name for himself at UFC 208
“I’m coming off a loss, and he’s coming off a win,” Teixeira told MMA Junkie. “Everyone deserves their opportunity. I don’t turn down any fights. It does bother me when someone chooses not to face me. At the start my career, I was turned down a lot. People were saying I wasn’t famous enough. Where’s the sense in that? If the UFC offers me a fight, I’ll accept it regardless of who it is. Of course, a fighter shouldn’t be fighting unknowns his entire career, but in this situation, I see no problem at all. I’ll fight, and I’ll prove to everyone I can go back to winning. And it’s fair to give a new guy an opportunity like this. Otherwise, who is he going to fight? The thing is to step into the cage is shut up the doubters.”
Teixeira has also challenged for the UFC Light Heavyweight Championship in the past, coming up short against then champion Jon Jones. Teixeira, who suffered the aforementioned defeat to Johnson, says that it wasn’t a lost tooth that the cameras caught flying in the air when Johnson clobbered him.
“No, I didn’t lose any teeth,” Teixeira said. “I took no damage to my teeth. I imagine it was some spit that people saw. It’s the way the camera captured it. Some peopled asked me, but nothing happened.”
UFC 208 takes place on Saturday, February 8 from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York with Holly Holm and Germaine De Randamie headlining.
