Paul Craig, a former UFC light-heavyweight contender, has announced his intention to explore new opportunities at middleweight.
The Scottish fighter has revealed that he is making an attempt to move down to 185 pounds and will make his debut in the middleweight division if he is successful.
Craig, who has a professional record of 16-6-1, suffered back-to-back losses to Volkan Oezdemir and Johnny Walker in his last two fights. However, before that, he had an unbeaten streak of six fights, which included a finish of current light heavyweight champion Jamahal Hill.
“We had this idea of going to middleweight, not because light heavyweight is done, but just the way light heavyweight is sitting at the moment, there’s not a lot of fights above me who I’m going to get to fight,” Craig said in the most recent episode of his “Leather’d Podcast.”
In a recent interview, UFC light heavyweight contender Paul announced his plan to test the waters in the middleweight division. Craig is currently recovering from a nose operation and plans to use his time off to see if he can make the weight for the 185-pound division. If successful, he hopes to make his middleweight debut in his next fight.
Paul Craig plan’s his next career move
While he doesn’t plan to make a permanent move to middleweight, Craig sees potential opponents in the division. He expressed interest in a potential matchup against Sean Strickland, noting that his jiu-jitsu skills could pose a problem for the weight-class.
Paul has previously submitted fighters such as Nikita Krylov and former title challenger Magomed Ankalaev.
Craig also pointed out that size would be a crucial factor in his potential move to middleweight. He highlighted that the current middleweight champion, Israel Adesanya, doesn’t have a lot of jiu-jitsu skills and that there aren’t many fighters in the top 15 with elite-level jiu-jitsu.
This could potentially give Craig an edge in the division.
Overall, Paul’s move to middleweight is still in the trial stage, but it will be interesting to see if he can successfully make the weight and how he fares in the division if he decides to make the move permanent.
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