One-time Bellator title challenger Austin Vanderford is plotting his MMA return, but he highly doubts Dillon Danis will be the opponent to welcome him back.
After securing his release following the merger between PFL and Bellator, Vanderford has been healing up some injuries while awaiting the right opportunity to book his next fight. As he pursued various options, Vanderford suddenly found himself in a position where Danis seemed like the perfect opponent after the former grappling champion decided to target his wife Paige VanZant in a series of social media posts.
While VanZant more than handled her own in the feud, she still proposed a fight between Vanderford and Danis as a way to settle the nastiness once and for all.
Unfortunately, that call has fallen on deaf ears.
“We haven’t ever heard anything back,” Vandeford recently told MMA Fighting. “I would sure love that, for sure. We could make some good moves with that.
“We’ve made it public that I would love to fight him and I would it do under whatever stipulations he would have or whatever. We haven’t ever heard anything back.”
Danis hasn’t competed in MMA since 2019, when he improved his record 2-0 with a submission win in Bellator before the promotion ultimately released him in 2023. Since then, Danis suffered a disqualification loss in an ugly boxing match against Logan Paul.
Danis is also currently embroiled in a lawsuit filed by Paul’s fiancée Nina Agdal alleging that he violated state and Federal revenge porn laws by posting illicitly obtained photos of her online.
There’s no word if Danis plans to compete again, but Vanderford still welcomes the challenge — and that’s the kind of fight that’s more personal than business.
“I’m sure he demands a lot of money,” Vanderford said. “I would just go fight him for whatever. I’d go fight him for free.”
For her part, VanZant doesn’t believe Danis would ever step up to the plate.
“Dillon would never fight him,” VanZant said. “I don’t know that he’ll ever fight again.”
Beyond a unlikely fight against Danis, Vanderford still hopes to return soon.
“Everything that went through with the PFL and Bellator, with the merger and stuff, I would have liked to have fought eight months ago,” Vanderford said. “I had a little injury and I kind of had a setback on a previous injury I had too, and then with all the uncertainty with Bellator and the PFL, there was a few month period where there was no fights, nothing was getting booked. Once all that got figured out, we kind of came up with a game plan.
“I train full time, all the time, no matter how busy we are and doing that. So just being ready. I also made the decision too that I was going to go back to 170 [pounds], so [I’m] working on getting my weight back down in a place where if a big opportunity arose in a week or two weeks, I’d be able to make 170 safely and be good there.”
In the bigger picture, Vanderford made it known that he would eventually like to earn a spot on the UFC roster, which was always his dream upon becoming a fighter.
He nearly got his chance back in 2018 after he scored a submission win on Dana White’s Contender Series, but UFC didn’t end up offering him a contract. That led to his arrival in Bellator, where he spent the next four-plus years.
Now a free agent again, Vanderford knows he has some work to do to get UFC’s attention, but he’s willing to do whatever it takes to finally earn his spot there.
“Getting into the sport, that’s pretty much all of our goals — we want to go fight in the UFC and go see what we can do,” Vanderford said. “Of course, I’m coming off a loss and had setbacks and stuff, but I feel mentally strong and I understand mistakes being made and stuff like that. I’ve just kept my head down and kept working and staying ready and staying prepared for the next thing.
“I’d like to get a fight booked, wherever it’s at, in the next few weeks and have something done by the end of July, beginning of August, so I can progress forward from there. I truly feel the healthiest I’ve been in a little while now. I’m just excited to get back out and compete, and especially watching [VanZant] just adds more fuel to the fire.”
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