At 38 years old and with 30 fights in the UFC, most would call it a day. But for lightweight veteran Michael Johnson, it’s just the beginning of the next five to ten years of his life, maybe even the peak of his professional career!
Coming off his second consecutive win with a hellish right hook KO of Ottoman Azatair at UFC Tampa, Johnson believes people are too quick to put a cap on age in the sport, on something they haven’t experienced themselves.
When asked by combat sports journalist, Kevin Iole, what the future looks like for him and if he would like to continue for another couple of years in the octagon, Johnson said that he is going to compete, till his body tells him “no more“.
“Whether that can be 5 years, 10 years… When I say 10 years, everybody looks at me like I am joking but I really think I could make it around to the next 5 years at least. For sure! I can put in 5 years but you know, 8 would be great. I just want to get into a position where I am okay I am done with the sport.”
While he is mostly considered a journeyman in the UFC, Johnson believes his ambitions dictate that he stay on longer. Afterall, fighters like Glover Texeira and Michael Bisping achieved greatness later on in their respective careers. Texeira fought all his life in the light heavyweight division, fighting against the likes of Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson, Rashad Evans, and Jon Jones.
But he never really reached his peak until he was 42 years of age when he defeated Jan Blachowicz to become the oldest UFC light heavyweight champion in history.
Johnson harbors similar dreams.
“I still want to accomplish things… I still want to continue to compete for a lightweight title…. I was just watching the George Foreman story not too long ago. And when he came back, he won the world title.”
Johnson believes the first step to going in that direction would be to challenge Justin Gaethje to a rematch.
Johnson vs. Gaethje 2?
He claimed that he had given Gaethje the opportunity to fight him when “nobody else wanted to” and said,
“I think everybody would love a Gaethje-Johnson 2. I gave him that opportunity when he came over… So, I think he should go ahead and give that back. We need to run one ’cause I know he knows he got away with that one.”
When Gaethje made his debut against him back in 2017, Johnson was a top title contender in the lightweight division.
However, it is unlikely that Gaethje will return the favor since he is currently a top 3 fighter in the division and will be more focused on finding his way back to a title shot.
But you never know. Gaethje allowed Holloway to challenge for the BMF tile when he could have sat at home and a title opportunity would have been presented to him!
