Cody Garbrandt was undefeated and making the first defense of his bantamweight title against former teammate TJ Dillashaw at UFC 217. The animosity between the two ran deep.
Garbrandt nearly put Dillashaw away in the opening round. Dillashaw survived and made it back to his corner for the second round. He came back to finish Garbrandt to become a two-time bantamweight champion. They ran it back at UFC 227, with Dillashaw winning via first-round TKO.
Dillashaw's goal was to become a dual champion, so he challenged Henry Cejudo in January 2019. Cejudo beat the brakes off Dillashaw to win in 32 seconds to retain the 125-pound belt. After the fight, it was revealed that Dillashaw failed pre-and post-fight drug tests for EPO. He was subsequently stripped of the title, which infuriated Garbrandt.
Heading into his UFC Fight Night headliner on Saturday against Rob Font, Garbrandt didn't hold back on his thoughts of meeting his bitter rival one more time before he eventually rides off into the sunset.
"I'm going to f— him up," Garbrandt bluntly told DAZN News. "Simple as that. That's a fight that you can say whatever you want about what happened in our fights. You know he was doping up 100 percent. You can look back on what I stated as I wanted more invasive testing (for our fights)."
Dillashaw's test failures didn't come as a surprise to Garbrandt. Hearing the news, Garbrandt (12-3) was livid as he felt Dillashaw had been cheating all along, and being on EPO not only played a role in their two fights, but it was something the former bantamweight champion had been on for a long time and finally paid for sins. "No Love" wants to make Dillashaw pay for what he cost him and past opponents.
"Karma caught up to him," Dillashaw said. "But I'm the baddest, motherf—ng karma that he's ever going to face. He caught me in a dire period of my life. I wasn't really focused, hungry, and a lot of other s—. No excuses going on. But that's a fight that I will have, and I will revenge those losses. I can say and say all this, but at the end of the day, we got to fight. Let me prove that he was on this s—. That's a fight that I want back more than anything, more than a title shot. That's the fight that I want. That's a fight that I want back, and I deserve.
"He stole a lot from me and stole a lot from everybody in the sport. You can't cheat the system. It's going to find ways to find you. It's going to haunt you. His legacy is tarnished. I whooped his ass when he was on it. He knows I whooped his ass. You know when you hit someone like that, like when I dropped him in Madison Square Garden. He's walking in potholes back to his corner, and he comes out like nothing. Please don't tell me you're not on any supplements there. The brain, the blood flow gets back turned back on, and he was ready to go in a minute. Most people don't come back from those shots. It's a future fight for me that I can't wait to get back."