Daley says he battled burnout but now fully prepped for Strikeforce title shot
You may have guessed this already, but Paul Daley (27-9-2 MMA, 2-0 SF) doesn't sugarcoat things. He admits he's wrestled with burnout after back-to-back camps for championship-length fights.
However, the British welterweight said he's pulled out of a temporary rut he hit in the middle of camp for his fight next Saturday with Strikeforce welterweight champion Nick Diaz (24-7 MMA, 5-0 SF), and he's fit and ready to go.
Fit, in this case, means in striking distance of 170 pounds, the limit he needs to make to vie for Diaz's belt per athletic commission guidelines.
In his most recent outing against Japanese welterweight Yuya Shirai, Daley missed weight by less than half of a pound and was fined a portion of his purse. It was the fifth time he did so in the past three years of his professional career, which included a high-profile gaffe at UFC 108 during his short-lived tenure in the octagon.
Daley previously told MMAjunkie that there was a valid reason for each of his misses, and this time around, fans can expect him to show up as he did for a performance against Scott Smith in which he earned the Strikeforce "Knockout of the Year" with a first-round KO.
"My weight is fine, but I'm not going to lie – I like to be honest," he said today during a conference call in support of "Strikeforce: Diaz vs. Daley," which takes place April 9 at the Valley View Casino Center in San Diego. "I'm coming from preparing for a five-round fight against Shirai, and then trying to bounce straight into another fight camp for a big fight wasn't ideal, and halfway through the camp, I did feel a little bit drained and had to take a few days off, whether it be physically or mentally."
Despite missing weight for his most recent fight, which took place this past month in British promotion BAMMA, Daley ended it with a bang by knocking out the Japanese fighter in the first round. That performance cleared the way for next Saturday's title shot.
But Daley got no break along the way.
"I would have liked to have a longer period time to prepare specifically for Nick," he said. "But saying that, it has it's positives and its negatives. My fitness is where it should be for a five-round fight, and we just concentrated on the stuff that we would have spread out over 12 weeks. We've just condensed it into the time we have.
"It's been quite intense and things are working as they should be."
Apart from issues on the scale, Daley has been on a tear since he was released from the UFC following his suckerpunch of Josh Koscheck at UFC 113. He stopped all but one of his four opponents in trademark fashion – a hail of strikes.
Diaz, who most recently submitted Evangelista "Cyborg" Santos in late January, may have had the luxury of more leisure in preparing for Daley.
But "Semtex" says he's ready to go.
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