UFC fighter Anthony Smith has been out of the cage for something and was quite surprised when he found out who his new opponent is.
The fighter is set to face Zhang Mingyang at UFC Kansas City, and the matchup comes as a bit of a surprise for Smith. The two fighters have quite a gap in their career, with Smith having been in over 24 bouts while Mingyang makes his third appearance in the octagon. Smith says he never knew about the fighter until the matchup, but he is content with the decision. In a recent episode of his podcast, Smith spoke about this bout and understanding how it might be challenging to get an opponent for Mingyang.
“I didn’t have any suggestions, but I was very shocked with the matchup, for sure,” Smith said on his On Paper podcast. “That wasn’t a bad thing. I just was not expecting that one, but once I kind of looked into him a little bit and sat on it, it made a lot of sense why they would go in that direction.”
“I have a lot of conversations with these guys—and if they did, they’re probably not going to tell me—but Mick Maynard and Sean Shelby have always told me that they don’t care who wins,” Smith said. “They want good fights. They want interesting matchups. And they put people in positions and it’s up to you to do what you what you do with it.
“Of course, we can think of people that were favorably matched and put in some better positions than others. But, I’ve known Mick Maynard and Sean Shelby and those guys a really long time, and they’ve always been pretty straight-up with me, even in times that I don’t like it. They’ve always been very honest and very clear, and his explanation was really that [Zhang] is exciting, and we don’t know where he is in terms of his skill set, and he’s hyper-aggressive and hard to match up, and they know that I want a fight that’s going to be really exciting, not some boring scrape one out to finish my career. It’s probably going to be a highlight one way or the other, and that gives them an opportunity to let me have a fun fight and figure out where he’s at.”
The fighter’s last bout was against Dominick Reyes at UFC 310, where he suffered a second-round knockout loss. The loss was his fifth in the last seven fighters, and many believed he would retire afterward, but Smith wanted to have one more chance in the octagon before retiring.
“I didn’t get to conduct myself as if it was the last matchup or as if it was the last fight,” Smith said. “Obviously, I didn’t enjoy training camp at all, but I didn’t get to enjoy training camp knowing this is my first last week of camp. Then you get into fight week, like this is the last fight week and the last weight cut, and I didn’t get an opportunity—and not that I’m not going to see these people again because I do work for the UFC and do a lot of the broadcast stuff—but I didn’t get to tell everyone that helps me, that helps all of us do our jobs, how appreciative I was of what they do.
“And that’s every single person on the UFC staff. That’s even down to the people that pick you up from the airport, the PI staff that does your meals that you kind of just come and grab them and leave, I don’t know that they get to hear how appreciative people are all the time because it’s just such a rat race.
“But I want to walk through that fight week and weight cut and when you show up to the arena and just know not only is this the last time I have to do this, which there is a little bit of excitement about that, where I get to go on and I’ve got a whole life ahead of me, hopefully.”
For now, Smith is gearing up for his retirement bout and has resolved to take time to build himself against this younger and fresher opponent.
“I really haven’t thought about that part of it too much,” Smith said. “It’s just that I’m fat… so I’ve got to get my weight down and get into shape to start training camp. So that’s really what I’m focused on. I haven’t really gotten too deep into the fight camp feel mentality.”
While Zhang Mingyang doesn’t have a massive profile, Anthony Smith is correct in his assessment of the light-heavyweight. ‘Moutain Tiger’ has a very aggressive style, and has scored knockout wins in both UFC appearances thus far. He was last seen in the cage in November, scoring a first-round stoppage win over Ozzy Diaz.
