Rockhold plans to humiliate Bisping: 'This will not be his fairy tale'
Luke Rockhold wants to make sure that the biggest night of Michael Bisping's UFC career ends in bitter disappointment.
The reigning UFC middleweight champion is still searching for respect despite being only the second male fighter to hold titles in both the Strikeforce and UFC promotions.
Rockhold won a unanimous decision against Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza to capture Strikeforce gold in 2011. Four years later, he defeated Chris Weidman by TKO to take the UFC's 185-pound strap.
His first challenger is Bisping, a veteran competing for his first UFC title after 25 fights with the organization. "The Count" steps in for an injured Chris Weidman at UFC 199 on June 4 in Inglewood, Calif.
The two were put on a conference call to promote the event on Thursday, and Rockhold told reporters he couldn't care less about the 37-year-old Bisping's long road to contention.
"Any time you put in a full training camp like this, I want to have an end result," said Rockhold, according to Chuck Mindenhall of MMA Fighting. "I want to keep myself competing and obviously making dollars. Going out there and getting to shut Mike's mouth, and getting to shut all these guy's mouths, all these guys have made excuses - Mike, Chris Weidman, Jacare. Guess what, I beat them all. And I'm going to beat them all again, one at a time they're all going to get theirs.
"Mike, he's a tough dude, he took this fight, but this will not be his fairy tale. This will be his swansong. This will be the end of him. I am going to go out there and dominate this guy like he's never been before."
Rockhold's confidence is understandable. He's undefeated in his last five fights, which includes a submission win over Bisping on November 2014.
"The Count" earned his second crack at Rockhold with a unanimous decision win over Anderson Silva in February. Rockhold told Bisping that he's happy to fight him again, but not to expect things to be any better this time around.
"You earned this, I’ll give you that," said Rockhold. "You earned this fight. You beat a champion. You beat a champion in Anderson Silva and you would have probably won that fight handily if you didn’t complain about your mouthpiece and get clipped. But, you will not be a champion. I will humiliate you next week. It’s going to be so one-sided."