Kevin Lee not giving up on 165-pound division, suggests ‘backroom deal’ with Rafael Dos Anjos
If there’s one thing that UFC President Dana White has seemingly been more against than any other idea presented to him before, it’s the idea of a new 165-pound division.
Several fighters on the roster have come out and said they like the idea of a new division to bridge the gap between the light and welter weight classes. But no progress is appearing to be made.
One half of UFC Rochester’s main event on May 18, Kevin Lee has a suggestion though. As a strong advocate for the new division, Lee is moving up from 155 to 170-pounds where he’ll face a fellow former lightweight in Rafael Dos Anjos. Even though the bout is contracted as a 170-pound clash, Lee thinks they could work something out to where they both weigh in at 165 instead.
“Maybe, it might be a little backroom deal that we got on there,” Lee told MMA Junkie. “‘RDA’ is kind of, he don’t really give you too much to go off of, and he don’t really give you too much back and forth, so, you know – I’ll ask him, see what he thinks about it.
“If he’s down with it, I’d be down – and I’d cut an extra little five pounds for that, make a statement, make some noise. It’s in our contract, we ain’t got to, but I like to push some buttons.”
As for the eventual creation of an official new weight class of 165-pounds, ‘The Mo-Town Phenom’ still thinks it’s just a matter of time regardless of what the boss says.
“I think it’s inevitable,” he said. “I think we all kind of see that. I think it creates more work for them, and they don’t really see that much more benefit out of it. But, at the end of the day, when you talk about fighter safety and you talk about not having to dehydrate your brain and getting to fight a similar opponent, that’s what we’re looking for, is an even playing field.”
