UFC
Colby Covington Dismisses Fight Against ‘Irrelevant’ UFC Veteran Michael Chiesa

Colby Covington has dismissed any rumours over a possible fight with Michael Chiesa, as ‘Chaos’ labels the UFC veteran as ‘irrelevant’.
Colby Covington Dismisses Rumoured Fight With Michael Chiesa
Covington ended his one year absence from the sport since losing to Leon Edwards by returning to the UFC Octagon in December 2024 and suffered a disappointing defeat to Joaquin Buckley.
It was a fight that Covington took on short notice, however, he was outclassed throughout the match and ended up being stopped due to a cut above Covington’s in the third round to give Buckley the victory and closer to the welterweight title.
Since then, the former welterweight interim champion has not been handed another fight and there has been very little in of rumoured opponents.
However, Daniel Cormier posed a possible matchup for Covington and the former UFC heavyweight identified Michael Chiesa as an interesting option.
Chiesa is outside of the welterweight rankings after an underwhelming few years in MMA, however, he is coming off two consecutive rear naked choke victories over Tony Ferguson and Max Griffin.
Despite these victories, Covington dismissed any possibility over a fight against Chiesa and completely shut down the idea in a recent interview.
Covington said: “No I have no interest in fighting Michael Chiesa. He’s another irrelevant bum, who got submitted by Kevin Lee. The only reason he has any type of hype is because Kevin Lee made his mom famous.
“There’s no interest there. He’s a nobody, he’s a bum. But he was a great example for the Sonnen system, and Team Sonnen.
“We were able to tell fighters that this was the perfect representation of what you don’t want to do when you win The Ultimate Fighter.
“Don’t be a Michael Chiesa. Don’t become an irrelevant bum, who rides other people’s meat as a form of transportation. I’m talking about him riding DC’s meat for transportation, to try and get a big fight with me.
“He’s not a big fight, and he hasn’t done any business for the company – I know it won’t interest the UFC.”