Michael Chiesa didn’t see Tony Ferguson fight at UFC Abu Dhabi coming

Eight years after they were originally scheduled to compete in the UFC’s octagon, Michael Chiesa will get his chance to fight Tony Ferguson.

Chiesa and Ferguson face off in a welterweight tilt Saturday at UFC Abu Dhabi. The pairing was previously set for UFC Fight Night 91 in July 2016 before “Maverick” was forced to withdraw due to a back injury. When he was called about returning to the cage, Chiesa was stunned to find out who he was fighting.

“There was no other names discussed,” Chiesa said on The MMA Hour. “I knew at some point I was going to get the phone call, and Danny [Rubenstein], best manager in the game, called me, and it was just like, ‘You’re never going to believe who they’re calling me about.’ I’m just like, I said [Stephen Thompson] first. He’s like, ‘Who’s the one fight you’d want, [that] you’d like to have at 170 pounds?’ ‘Wonderboy,’ you know, we kind of talked about it for a while. He’s like, ‘It’s not him,’ he’s like, ‘Say someone else,’ and I forget who the second name was. And then I was like, ‘Just tell me who it is.’ He said it’s Tony Ferguson.

“I was just like, whoa, I didn’t see that coming.”

The bout serves as Chiesa’s first in more than a year after being submitted in the first round by Kevin Holland at UFC 291 in July 2023. The 36-year-old enters the fight for the first time on the heels of a three-fight skid.

After receiving the news he would be facing Ferguson, Chiesa looked at it as a full-circle experience.

“I thought I’d be, if I still had a ranking next to my name, I think it’d be like a Randy Brown and Elizeu [Zaleski],” Chiesa said. “These guys kind of jockeying to get into the top 15, but the reality is I don’t have that number next to my name. So the possibilities are endless. I didn’t expect it to be Tony Ferguson.

“It’s ironic that I’m talking to you [now] because when I was in training camp for Tony in 2016, it was ... eight years ago today I got in a really bad car accident, and that was kind of the [moment]. I was kind of going through some personal problems in training camp. I was kind of depressed, really depressed and I went to the store to get groceries. On the way home, I hadn’t slept much the night before and I fell asleep at the wheel and I wrecked my truck. I didn’t have a seat belt on, got a concussion, smashed my head on the window. and then within a few days, that’s when I ruptured my L-4, L-5 [vertebrae] that training camp.

“So that car wreck was like the catalyst that led into me having to withdraw from that fight, which was honestly probably the lowest point in my adult life. I’ve never felt lower than that, and it’s just crazy I’m talking to you ... eight years ago from the day it happened, and I’m excited to get this opportunity to go fight Tony.

Ferguson’s losing streak is more than twice as long as Chiesa’s at seven straight.

Chiesa understands that neither are on a run to a world title anymore, or anything really close to it. But it’s an opportunity to put a dark time behind him.

“We’re both not at the highest points of our careers, obviously, but it’s a fight where it’s like, it’s the one that got away from me,” Chiesa said. “So I’m really excited to fight him and kind of lay to rest some of those personal demons I had eight years ago, go out there lock horns with a guy that I’ve had a ton of respect for, [who] at one point was the boogeyman in my weight class.

“So I’m excited for the opportunity and I love fighting in Abu Dhabi. I feel at home out there and I only have so many fights left, and I’m excited that this is one of them.”