NEWARK — In the aftermath of Joaquin Buckley’s decision loss to former champion Kamaru Usman last June, which snapped a six-fight win streak, the exciting welterweight contender took stock of his overall game after realizing “there’s levels to this.”
Buckley (21-7), who returns on the main card of UFC 328 on Saturday in Newark, New Jersey, in a top-10 matchup against Sean Brady (18-2), put a pause on his typically active fight schedule in order to spend the last 11 months working on his game.
A 32-year-old native of St. Louis, Buckley spent one of those weeks during training camp improving his grappling with Usman and Vicente Luque, after accepting an invitation to join them at Kill Cliff FC in Deerfield Beach, Florida.
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“No matter how much you wrestle, if that’s someone’s bread and butter, that’s their bread and butter,” Buckley told CBS Sports at Tuesday’s UFC 328 media availability in Morristown. “But, don’t get it twisted. Still, my wrestling is pretty good and the guy I got handed with, Sean Brady, I feel like I will be able to do things against him that will show my overall game.
“I feel like with the 11 months I have been out, a lot of people just don’t realize how much I have been able to train. Sean Brady is a good grappler, for sure, but he’s not a wrestler. If you know, you know.”
Buckley was also very vocal about the lack of quality ground skill he sees in some at the top of the division, including former champion Jack Della Maddalena. In fact, it’s the Australian fighter’s performance in losing his title over five one-sided rounds against Islam Makhachev last November that makes Buckley believe the current 170-pound king is anything but unbeatable.
“I don’t want to sound disrespectful when I say that but who did [Makhachev] beat in order to become a welterweight champion?” Buckley mentioned. “No disrespect to JDM but he didn’t prove much to anybody when he even got the title shot. Now, with myself, I was on a six-fight winning streak and I was knocking out all ranked opponents. I called for [a Makhachev] fight to happen if Shavkat [Rakhmonov] did not show up, so that I could take his place. But they didn’t call on me.
“At the end of the day, Islam has lost before. He has taken an L and he’s in a very dangerous weight class. I truly believe he got one of the easiest fights he could have when he took that title.”
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Buckley’s lack of respect for Della Maddalena’s skills also extend to his breakdown of top contender Carlos Prates’ third-round TKO of last weekend, which took place in JDM’s backyard of Perth, Australia.
“What [Prates] did to JDM, we have seen someone break him before but the way that Prates did it, he physically broke JDM,” Buckley mentioned. “I feel like JDM, in his first title defense against Islam, he was mentally broken. With all that being mentioned and Carlos Prates being No. 2 in the rankings, he can argue that. But at the end of the day, a lot of people’s performance can speak volumes. A good performance on May 9 [against Brady], they can call their shot.”
Makhachev is expected to make his first title defense this summer in a return that has been rumored might come against Ian Machado Garry in August.
“[Garry] has the ability to win because the fight starts on the feet [each round], at the end of the day. But I just don’t think these guys understand the levels,” Buckley mentioned. “With Ian Garry saying he stopped Belal [Muhammad’s] shots, Islam is going to be different. You can’t compare a Belal to an Islam when it comes to wrestling.”
Buckley, who has taken on the comedic alternate personality of “Buckomedov” in recent months as a nod to his improved wrestling, knows a victory this weekend over Brady could be huge toward his future title hopes, especially considering he has won six of seven fights since moving down to welterweight in 2023.
Brady, a 33-year-old native of Philadelphia, has won eight of 10 fights under the UFC banner but his two defeats – against Muhammad in 2022 and Michael Morales last November – both came via TKO.
“To me, Brady has never been knocked out before,” Buckley mentioned. “Yes, he has been stopped and he has been finished. But at the end of the day, he hasn’t been knocked out. He never experienced having to wake up and ask the doctor what happened. That’s one of the things I know I can do to Sean Brady. But don’t get it twisted, he is great at what he does. If he gets the fight to the ground, ‘Buck’ have to watch out. He has those kimura locks where he can take your arm back home with him.”
