Stephen Thompson promises to put on a show against Joaquin Buckley at UFC 307.
The fan-friendly strikers will meet in a welterweight clash in the featured preliminary matchup at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Saturday night. Meanwhile, the main card action will be kicked off by a middleweight matchup between Roman Dolidze and Kevin Holland, whom “Wonderboy” defeated via corner stoppage in 2022.
On one hand, Thompson is glad to have the featured preliminary spot, as it means a lot less hassle behind the scenes. However, Thompson thinks his matchup against Buckley, a potential “Fight of the Night,” deserved to be on the main card. That being said, Thompson acknowledges that he has only dropped a submission loss against Shavkat Rakhmonov in December 2023 since his victory over Holland. Meanwhile, “Trailblazer” has since gone 3-2, most recently breaking Michal Oleksiejczuk’s arm to earn a first-round stoppage at UFC 302 this past June. All things considered, Thompson is more excited to return to action than anything else.
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“When you’re on the main card, there’s a lot of wait. You have to wait for the entry, there’s more commercials on pay-per-view. So to be the main event on the prelims, it’s cool to be able to go out there and get it over with,” Thompson told Submission Radio. “But at the same time, I think this fight deserves to be on the main card. I think me and Joaquin Buckley and go out there and really put on a show, possibly ‘Fight of the Night.’ But you also gotta look at – I haven’t fought since December [2023], so it’s been a while. Holland’s been out there, putting in work. So are these other guys, you have Jose Aldo that’s going to be on the main card as well. But it’s been a while man and I’m kind of looking forward to it to be honest with you.”
Thompson believes his matchup against Buckley will go the distance, at the end of which he will have his hand raised. And the welterweight veteran vows to show over the course of 15 minutes that the booking deserved a main card slot.
“I don’t visualize any knockouts. I visualize my hand being raised at the end of the fight,” Thompson said. “I’m prepared for a three, five-minute round war. I feel like this could have been a main event actually, kind of like me and Kevin Holland. It would have been a great one for a Fight Night or something. But here we are man, [UFC] 307, main event on the prelim card. We’re gonna go out there and show everybody what’s up. That we deserve to be on that pay-per-view card.”
