Michael Chandler lost the Bellator MMA Lightweight Title to Brent Primus earlier this year at Bellator 180.
Citing apparent lies told by the new champion, the former champ has decided to move on from him to focus on new challenges.
“I have been asking to fight Brent Primus since I sat there in that studio on that chair (two days after Bellator NYC),” Chandler said on The MMA Hour. “I asked for the fight in October at Mohegan Sun. I asked for it in November at Penn State. I asked for it in December overseas. But I am a professional fighter, I am a prize fighter. I’m not going to sit around and wait for somebody who, he himself just had a child and he’s on maternity leave right now, so he just wants to sit around and not do anything. So I’m not going to wait. I have a lot bigger fish to fry and a lot bigger things to do than wait around for somebody who honestly just doesn’t want to take a fight. I don’t know what his reasoning is besides he’s just busy, but you know me well. I’ve been fighting for eight years, he has been fighting for eight years — he has eight fights, I have 20 fights. I’ve fought injured. I’ve called out the biggest names in the division and the division above me. So you know what the real truth is in this scenario.”
Primus recently stated in an interview that Chandler had turned down the opportunity to fight him so he can fight Goiti Yamauchi instead.
Chandler is also claiming that Primus doesn’t want to defend the title, calling him a part time fighter.
“I was asking to fight him. Bellator wanted to make the fight. But you can’t force somebody to fight,” Chandler said. “I’ve been in this situation numerous times now, where I am telling Bellator, ‘I want to fight, I want to fight this guy, I want to fight, just give me any fight,’ and Bellator has some people on the roster who just don’t want to fight. They’re part-time fighters. This guy that we are talking about is a part-time fighter. He’s been fighting eight years, and only in one of those years has he fought more than one time. I am the most upset fighter in the entire world that I only fought one time in the calendar year of 2017, because that’s not who I am. I’m a professional fighter, I want to fight numerous times a year. I want to go out there, be put on a platform and beat somebody up in front of millions of people. This guy wants to… not. He’s literally the exact opposite of me. So I’ve got some bigger fights, man. ... I’ve been calling out (Rory) MacDonald, I’ve been calling out Paul Daley. The little Patricio Pitbull sister has been wanting to fight me ever since I literally mangled his brother on national television and almost beat him within an inch of his life. So, I have a lot more fights that I can take than this rematch. To me, the belt doesn’t mean anything to me. I don’t need the belt to prove who I am. The belt, to me, is just an ornament at this point. I just want to fight.”
Bellator 192 takes place on Saturday, January 20 from The Forum in Inglewood, California with Douglas Lima and Rory MacDonald headlining. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event, which airs live on Spike TV.
