‘Don’t be a b*tch, just say yes’: Reinier de Ridder slams Paulo Costa over fight stipulations

Every time Reinier de Ridder thinks he’s about to get some time off, the UFC comes calling with another offer and he inevitably says yes.

The latest example came after de Ridder dispatched former middleweight champion Robert Whittaker to extend his win streak to 4-0 in the octagon and he barely had time to get home before he received an offer to face Anthony “Fluffy” Hernandez in a potential No. 1 contender’s bout at UFC Vancouver. While he was expecting a little break, de Ridder admits he didn’t blink when the UFC reached out to him because he knew one more win over somebody like Hernandez was the perfect exclamation point to get him a title shot.

Sadly, those plans changed just a couple of weeks later.

“They called me and said why don’t we do the ‘Fluffy’ fight? I said why not,” de Ridder told MMA Fighting. “So I got back to work. I put a lot of work in that first couple of weeks because of the cardio thing. I really wanted to get that part right because it was ‘Fluffy.’ I went to work like crazy early on. Then a couple of weeks in, they called me and told me he was out. Asked me if I wanted to remain on the card and I wanted to. I think it’s smart timeline wise to fight now to line myself up for the next ‘Don’t be a b*tch, just say yes’: Reinier de Ridder slams Paulo Costa over fight stipulations shot. They were happy for me to stay on the card.

“It was a bit of a struggle to find somebody so for a couple of days, I thought maybe there would not be any fight. I was a bit disappointed in that but eventually Brendan [Allen] was the guy to step up, take the fight so I’m very happy about it.”

Now de Ridder is scheduled to face Brendan Allen in the five-round main event from Canada but he wasn’t actually the UFC’s first choice.

Initially, the promotion reached out to former title challenger Paulo Costa to fill the spot vacated by Hernandez after he recently picked up a win over Roman Kopylov at UFC 318. While not the top-ranked contender he once was, Costa is still a name that draws eyeballs whenever he competes and his addition to the main event seemed to be a great idea.

In the end, de Ridder revealed that Costa just wanted too many concessions to actually consider taking the fight, which admittedly didn’t sit too well with him.

“Costa would have been fun just because it’s a fun dude,” de Ridder said. “The entire buildup would have been cool. So he was up first, we were in conversation with him first but he put up too many stipulations.

“He wanted a catchweight. He wanted three rounds instead of five. So we said if you don’t want it then you don’t get it. Then we moved onto Brendan, which I’m very happy with as well.”

Based on the UFC’s own standings, Allen is currently the No. 9 ranked middleweight while Costa is sitting behind him at No. 13. On paper that makes Allen the better choice but de Ridder knows Costa carries name value, which sometimes means more than a ranking.

Obviously, de Ridder accepted Costa with no strings attached but the Brazilian couldn’t say the same thing.

“I would say if you get an opportunity like that, don’t be a bitch. Just say yes,” de Ridder said about Costa. “Don’t put any stipulations there and he would have had a great chance to be back into title conversation.

“But he put all those stipulations there and we said we’ll move on and see if there’s somebody else who just wants to take the fight. I think maybe even if we said no, Paulo, it has to be middleweight and five rounds, maybe he would have still have taken it but it was already too late unfortunately. Maybe one day. It would be fun to get all the buildup with him someday.”

When it comes to Allen as an opponent, de Ridder has some familiarity because they both trained under the same roof at Kill Cliff FC. After joining the UFC roster from ONE Championship, de Ridder sought out the Florida based gym to give him some new looks and he loved it there so much that he eventually relocated his entire family to the area.

While they were working with a lot of the same coaches and teammates, de Ridder says he never actually got the chance to work with Allen because his upcoming opponent just had no interest in it.

“The first few times I came in, he was there,” de Ridder explained. “I don’t give a f*ck. I just went up to him and said hi and what’s up and let’s train but he didn’t want to train. I respect that as well. It is what it is. We’ll find out now.

“I don’t care too much about training. I’ll train with anybody. It’s not like you’re going to find out something that you’re going to use against me in the fight, in my mind. It is what it is. He didn’t want to train so it didn’t happen and now we’re going to find out in the cage.”

Stylistically, de Ridder didn’t have to change too much going from Hernandez to Allen, although based on past performances most are expecting this upcoming fight to pit two top grapplers against each other.

For his part, de Ridder doesn’t discount that possibility, although he definitely sees a stark contrast between his ground game and what Allen brings to the table.

“His grappling is good but a bit sloppy at times,” de Ridder said. “He falls off the back very frequently so maybe that’s something he’s adjusted by now. Has decent submissions, very opportunistic. He jumps on stuff when he sees it. His wrestling is decent. He has decent takedowns, decent takedown defense, not too great.

“But I think the thing that he lacks in the most, he kind of fades in the later rounds. He starts very hard, very sharp and very good in the first round, he’s very dangerous as he did against [Nassourdine] Imavov. He got on top and controlled him basically the entire round, as he did in the ‘Fluffy’ fight, he did very well in the first round as well. But then in the later rounds, he kind of fades a little bit. He doesn’t even look that tired but something changes and he’s not the same guy in the later rounds. So we’ll see for this one.”

On paper the stakes have changed slightly but de Ridder believes the result should still stay the same where an emphatic win — most notably a finish — should put him in position to battle for a UFC title next.

“That’s the goal,” de Ridder said about putting Allen away. “If I can do that, I think it’s very clear who the top contender is.”