Chad Mendes was a guest on Submission Radio and had a lot to say about two of his biggest featherweight rivals. Regarding Frankie Edgar and their upcoming fight on December 11th at the TUF 22 Finale in Las Vegas, he doesn’t feel like the wrestling skill of both competitors will cancel each other out:
“He’s a great MMA wrestler, he’s good at timing, but I feel like – obviously he just fought Urijah Faber. I train with Urijah every single day. And so I have insight. Like, I know what he’s going to be feeling like in certain positions. I’ve been training a lot with Urijah on Frankie, feeling this out……. I feel very confident. I feel like my wrestling, obviously I’m gonna be looking to mix it up everywhere with this fight”
He went on to say that he feels that his power will be the big difference in the fight with Edgar
“He has a lot more output, he uses more volume punches, but you know, there’s a lot of mistakes that I see, that he makes when he’s in there, throwing punches. So I think someone like me, who’s fast, explosive, powerful, can be a big danger for someone like him, that’s coming in a lot and loves to be in the pocket, [where] you get hit with big punches”
When pressed about questions regarding his conditioning, Mendes lashed out at fans of Conor McGregor and brought up his own past as evidence that conditioning will not be an issue
“The only people that are questioning my conditioning are Conor McGregor nut-hangers, and that’s just because he said that…. look at my fight with Aldo. I fought Aldo, who’s one of the best pound for pound fighters in the world. I went five rounds with him and pushed the pace the entire time. When I’m prepared, my cardio is never an issue. It never has been. There’s been one other fight with [Nik] Lentz, where I was sick and fought through it, and still beat that guy, who in my opinion would destroy Conor…… I took that fight on short-notice, and that’s why it was an issue in that fight.”
And in regards to a rematch with Conor McGregor, Mendes has no doubt how that fight would go
“I train a proper fight, I kill Conor. And I don’t think my conditioning is gonna be a problem in this fight. You guys got to see what happened in the first two rounds. I mean, I took him down and was able to land shots at will. I mean, big elbows, big punches. The guy doesn’t have much off his back. And me in shape, I’m able to bounce around on the feet, stay light on my feet, take him down whenever I want. I feel like I could beat that guy just with the cardio alone with my wrestling.”
On back to back night in Las Vegas in December, Mendes will fight Edgar for the #1 contender’s spot and Jose Aldo and McGregor will battle for the Featherweight title. The two winners are expected to fight in 2016 in what will be one of the year’s most anticipated fights.