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Greg Hardy recently signed with Bare Knuckle FC, and he's excited to step into a ring and fight without having to worry about takedowns or grappling. According to the former NFL defensive end, it was his lack of wrestling skills that cost him his spot on the UFC's roster.
Speaking to Chris Van Vliet, Hardy detailed the conversation he had with the UFC where they let him know they wouldn't be re-signing him. He was nothing but complimentary towards the promotion, declaring:
"The best organization that I've ever been a part of, not even second to the NFL. They hit me up, my contract was already up so we knew it was up. They hit me up, told me 'If you get some wrestling going in another promotion, we'd be glad to sign you back. Love having you. Appreciate you.' And I sent them my thank yous and love, went looking for where I can throw these hands, and found BFKC. It was actually a really good parting and I look forward to going back one day and putting on a show for you guys and maybe body slamming somebody for about three rounds once I learn some wrestling."
Hardy added that there was just too much for him to learn in a short period of time to compete against top-ranked UFC fighters.
"With BKFC I've spent most of my time boxing, so now I get to be inside my realm. We're focused more on the actual boxing aspect, the conditioning aspect, conditioning my knuckles, my mindset for a different style of fighting ... A lot of my MMA was grappling, ground and pound, different things that I had to make up for in a fight as opposed to working on a lot of what I'm good at which is boxing, striking."
Watch the full interview with Greg Hardy below:
Greg Hardy left the UFC on a three fight losing streak, and his record sits at 7-5 MMA (4-5 UFC) record. Out of the three fighters on that final run, two took advantage of Hardy's poor ground game to force TKOs with ground and pound. Tai Tuivasa didn't bother and knocked Hardy out on the feet.
Greg Hardy blames big weight cut for poor performances in the UFC
Greg Hardy is a big heavyweight and had to cut a significant amount of weight to hit the 266 pound limit for the division. He almost became the first heavyweight in UFC history to miss weight for his fight against Tai Tuivasa in July 2021, but managed to sweat out the extra pound on his second weigh-in attempt.
According to Hardy, those weight cuts were putting a serious damper on his UFC performances. He told Chris Van Vliet:
"A lot of people didn't really understand. I was walking into the ring half of myself. No energy, no charisma. It wasn't even 'G Hardy' in there. I was coming down from like 320, 330, every fight losing 30, 40 pounds before a fight, it was hurting."
Fortunately for Greg Hardy, there is no weight limit to Bare Knuckle FC's heavyweight division, meaning he can show up as big as he wants and not have to worry about the scale. As of now, no date has been set for Hardy's BKFC debut.
