Tyron Woodley recently announced on the UFC Fight Night Hidalgo weigh-ins broadcast that he would face Stephen Thompson Nov. 12 at UFC 205 in Madison Square Garden.

Appearing on the "Anik and Florian" podcast yesterday, the current UFC welterweight champion spoke about the fight against Thompson for the first time. To kick off the conversation, Woodley addressed that fact he had opened up as the underdog with the bookmakers.

"It doesn't motivate me," Woodley said. "I've been the underdog a couple of times. I was the underdog against Kelvin Gastelum until he missed weight and then the betting odds changed. I was then the larger underdog against Robbie Lawler until the camp thing came out and then people saw what I really did. People can see through the 'bs.' The thing that motivates me about this fight is, 'Wonderboy' I respect as an opponent, but I really don't respect him as a man."

Specifically, Woodley pointed to Thompson's action on social media as the cause for his criticism.

"He knows that he's committed to this fight and I'm going to flick the switch to go," Woodley said. "For him to charade around like I'm terrified to fight him and retweeting and liking all these posts...For someone to be so good as he is at getting affirmation and for getting people to like him, I can't respect that.

"For some reason, he's really managed to get underneath my skin. I just don't buy it, I just don't buy that fake humble [persona]. I just don't buy it. For someone to portray something they aren't, it just gets underneath my skin. I'm going to funnel all that energy into my strategy and try to get him out of there quick."

Woodley also revealed to host Jon Anik that seven weeks was more than enough time to prepare for Thompson, as he had already been preparing to face him for some time.

"The preparations for Wonderboy Thompson have been going for years," Woodley said. "I'm a fighter that's a young, hungry, up-and-coming fighter. I knew how dangerous I was, so I've always been thinking about these things when I've been coming up. He's just the first of these fighters that [has] made it to the point where I'm actually going to be facing them.

"I was looking at guys like him at the same time as the likes of Gunnar Nelson, Brandon Thatch, Neil Magny, Rick Story--all these fighters that were right on the cusp and just one or two victories away from being right in the picture. He's just the first one to make it up there. I've been watching him a lot longer than he realizes."





The current UFC welterweight champion then talked about his previous request for a "money fight," assuring Anik than he was indeed getting paid well for his first title defense at UFC 205 in New York's historic Madison Square Garden.

"For sure, people misunderstood what I said when I said I wanted a 'money fight,'" Woodley said. "Maybe I should rephrase that, because people confused that and thought I didn't care about the sport anymore and just wanted to do it for the fun. But when you are watching a non-title fight and seeing guys making four times the amount of money that a champion is making, it really takes the flavor away from being a champion.

"Me getting the money fight means being paid what I think a champion should be paid. So when I fight Wonderboy, this will be a money fight. Unlike some of the other guys in the different divisions my fights that I asked for made sense."

To Woodley, for a fight to make sense, it must check more than one box.

"Not only were they good fights, but they were also legacy fights," Woodley continued. "You can't deny Nick Diaz is a not a top-10, hall-of-fame welterweight--same with Georges St-Pierre, who is overall number one right now. For me to fight those guys, it checks off one more top opponent on my resume. When I say GSP or Nick Diaz, that sounds like I'm continuing that [building his legacy]. When I say Wonderboy or Demian Maia, it doesn't have that thing.

"Granted, they do deserve it at this current time, but overall legacy, you can't take away from the fact that those title defenses under my belt [against GSP and Nick Diaz] make me sound more like a Hall of Fame fighter."