Featured image courtesy of Cage Fury Fighting Championships
Undefeated welterweight prospect Danny Barlow will look to secure a shot on the Dana White Contender Series.
Barlow, 5-0, who won the Attitude MMA Fights belt in his last bout, draws Jarious Gill for a Cage Fury Fighting Championships welterweight match on Friday at CFFC 121.
Barlow said he is not overlooking Gill, who he considers a “legit” opponent.
“I watched him. He beat some OK guys,” Barlow told MMASucka. “I don’t know if he’s fought guys at my caliber of opponents yet. But it’s a fight.”
Barlow said he grew up an underdog and is now giving “prizes to the little fish.” He said he was a legit 2-0 as a professional when a lot of undefeated fighters with five or six bouts didn’t want to give him a shot.
“So now I’m taking the chance and I’m doing something that was never done for me,” Barlow said.
Barlow was told by his management that he would likely get a shot on the Contender Series with a win on Friday. But a misunderstanding nearly put the fight in jeopardy, according to Barlow.
“[Thursday], I was cutting weight for this fight,” Barlow said. “My management called me because they said they were pulling me from the fight because they got news of me fighting on the Contender Series in September.”
Barlow was 176 pounds at the time and rehydrated, thinking his fight with Gill was off. He got a call back after he rehydrated 8 to 10 pounds.
“They told me I still have to fight,” he said.
Barlow said Gill’s camp did not want to do a catchweight of 180 or 175 pounds. He got to 171.8, and Gill’s camp, Barlow said, was debating on whether to take the bout. Barlow cut the last pound in the hour allotment and made the weight.
“It was hard. You’ve gotta understand how hard it is to do an April Fools on your body. Like, bruh. You know what I’m saying? It was hard, but we did it. It’s been one of them types of days. This is the real fight game.”
The weight is in order and the fight is still on. Now Barlow knows he needs to take care of business to get the Contender Series shot.
“Of course, going to the UFC is the big goal. And to be a fight away from it, man, I don’t know how I feel. This is it. It made pretty much everything as far as I do. It’s just more work to be done. It’s another step. More pressure. There’s more work to put in. It can’t mean too much until I put that work in. It’d mean a lot, though, to have the opportunity. It just means I’ve gotta put in some more work.”
Barlow initially wouldn’t have minded signing with another promotion, he said. But now that he’s two wins away from a UFC contract, his mind has shifted. The goal, he said, is to make a living. And if it makes sense, he’ll do it.
“The UFC is the best. It’s the NBA of fighting. I don’t believe if you want to be the best in the world, you can be the best in the world fighting anywhere else other than the UFC.”
Barlow will have to beat Gill to take that next step.
“We all wish to have a finish,” he said. “I wish to have a good finish. I don’t know about this one. I just predict a win. A unanimous win. I don’t know how tough the guy is. I can’t really make a clear statement on it. My goal is to always finish fights, and I have an 80 percent finishing rate, so it can happen. I’m just respecting the ignorance of my opponent. I’d rather be on my P’s and Q’s than thinking I’ll blow out somebody. If it becomes a blowout, it’s a blowout. My potential of blowing people out is there for sure. I’m predicting there’s at least a unanimous decision for sure.”
CFFC 121 is set to go down Friday at the Horseshoe Casino & Hotel in Tunica, Mississippi. The card will air on UFC Fight Pass.
