Bryan Battle believes he should have won his UFC Vegas 88 fight against Ange Loosa, which ended in a no-contest due to an accidental eye poke, and expressed his desire to move on to ranked competition in his next UFC bout.
Bryan Battle walked away from UFC Vegas 88 with a no-contest on his record. But, he reckons it should be a win. Why? An accidental eye poke left Ange Loosa unable to carry on.
The action came to a halt in the second round. It was a thumb to the eye. The doc checked on Loosa as he tried to recover. At one point, Loosa said he couldn’t see. That was enough for the ref to call it quits.
After the fight, Battle confronted Loosa. The welterweights traded some heated words. Security had to step in to separate them. Battle later spoke about the incident. He claimed Loosa didn’t want to continue.
“I knew what kind of shape I was in coming into this fight,” Battle said on the UFC Vegas 88 post-fight show. He was confident in his power and grappling skills. He wasn’t surprised that anyone feeling his strength would look for an exit.
Battle believes he’s at a whole new level now. He thinks anyone in the division feeling his power will find it different. “This is high-level, this is top-notch,” he said. He was shocked by Loosa’s reaction and his audacity to talk about wanting to fight after quitting.
The broadcast showed replays of Battle’s eye poke that stopped Loosa. But Battle, an alum of The Ultimate Fighter 29, didn’t think it was that serious. “It wasn’t even that [serious],” he said. He felt Loosa saw an opportunity to escape and took it.
Battle was furious during a post-fight interview with Michael Bisping. He unleashed a tirade of expletives at Loosa. Backstage, he was a bit calmer but still not interested in settling scores.
Battle sees his fight with Loosa as a win. He’s keen to move onto ranked competition for his next UFC bout. “I don’t think he wants a rematch,” Battle said about Loosa. He’s looking forward to moving up the rankings.
“I feel like I won the fight,” he said. He believes everyone watching knows he won. He’s eager to be in the video game and all that jazz. He’s confident he beat Ange. “Technically, it will go down as a no-contest but anybody who watches that knows what happened.”
If the UFC wants a rematch, Battle’s game. But he’s got his eyes on the future. He’s ready to climb the rankings.