Aaron Pico wants to right his wrong against Lerone Murphy.
Pico (15-5 MMA, 2-1 UFC) was knocked out by Murphy in his octagon debut at UFC 319. He has since rebounded with back-to-back wins over Patricio Freire and a first-round knockout of Losene Keita at UFC 333. As Pico looks to continue his ascent up the featherweight ladder, he sees a rematch vs. Murphy (17-1-1 MMA, 9-1-1 UFC) making sense.
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He thinks he was merely caught when they first fought.
“I want that fight,” Pico told MMA Junkie of Murphy. “And people are going to ask me, ‘Why do you want that fight?’ I’m a competitor. I want to fight and get that one back. I mean, obviously you watch the fight, I was beating him up. If I just would have been a little bit smarter, I would have gotten that win.
“But there’s a lot of lessons that came because of the loss, and that’s the reason that I would love to run it back. And why wouldn’t I? He’s top five in the world, so it just puts me closer to fighting for a title, and I know I can beat him. So yeah, I would love to fight him for sure.”
Another fighter Pico is targeting is Movsar Evloev (20-1 MMA, 10-1 UFC), whom he was scheduled to debut against before Evloev withdrew. Evloev was finished by featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 333, which makes him a realistic matchup for Pico – but maybe not quite yet.
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“I’d love to fight Movsar,” Pico said. “We were supposed to fight, but I think it’s going to be a while before he comes back. I mean, especially after that and his long training camp. Stylistically, that’s a really good matchup for me, but I don’t know when he’s going to return. I don’t think it’s going to be anytime soon.”
This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Aaron Pico eager to rematch Lerone Murphy: ‘I know I can beat him’
