Kelvin Gastelum didn’t like Joe Pyfer’s negative comments about Mexico.
Gastelum and Pyfer were scheduled to scrap in earlier this year in Mexico City before the latter came down with a last-minute illness that forced him to bow out of the bout. Frustrated by the situation, Pyfer placed the blame on Mexico, calling it a “shit hole” country and vowing never to return.
Needless to say, Gastelum, a Mexican-American, didn’t take kindly to the remark.
“Obviously, it did leave a little bit of a sour taste in my mouth,” Gastelum said during the UFC 316 media day. “I just think the way he went about it was a little rude. He shouldn’t say those things about other people’s countries, and I just think he should have been better about the way he went about it. I don’t think those comments were right.”
Kelvin Gastelum was careful about when to rebook his bout with ‘Bodybagz’
Initially, the UFC wanted to rebook Gastelum and Pyfer’s fight for the following weekend, but the one-time interim middleweight title challenger felt that would only give his opponent an advantage.
“Yeah, you know, they wanted me to fight Joe Pyfer. I didn’t want it to be the next weekend. I just think that would give him an advantage—you know, higher weight class, not in elevation. It would just give him the advantage. So, we settled on June 7th here in New Jersey, and you know, I’m a company man. I kind of do what I’m told. They wanted Joe Pyfer, and we rebooked him.”
Instead, they’ll square off inside the Prudential Center this Saturday night. Gastelum enters the bout having won two of his last three, including decision wins over Chris Curtis and Daniel Rodriguez.
As for Pyfer, ‘Bodybagz’ is 4-1 inside the Octagon, his lone loss coming against Jack Hermansson in 2024. He’s since bounced back with a brutal 85-second knockout of Marc-André Barriault around this same time last year.
