Khamzat Chimaev declines Olympic champion Kyle Snyder’s challenge; Snyder still hopes to face him in RAF

Khamzat Chimaev is one of the most imposing figures on the entire UFC roster but even he admits there are some challenges that would put him at a massive disadvantage.

Just days away from his first middleweight title defense against Sean Strickland at UFC 328, Chimaev is also gearing up for his expected debut in RAF after signing with the promotion recently. RAF has featured numerous UFC stars since first launching but Chimaev might be the biggest, especially given his wrestling and grappling background.

While he’s still awaiting word on his first opponent, Chimaev admits that his level of competition in RAF is likely going to come against fellow fighters who also come from a similar background but he doesn’t see himself going against the top wrestlers in the world. That includes Olympic champion Kyle Snyder, who named Chimaev as one of the only UFC fighters he’d be interested in facing in RAF if that option was presented to him.

“I could grapple with Bo Nickal,” Chimaev told Adam Zubayraev on YouTube. “He switched to MMA, too, he’s an MMA fighter now. It’s interesting to compete with fighters who are in MMA. But how does it make sense to wrestle an Olympic champion? What’s the point? That’s more like a super fight.

“There’s no real point in doing that right now. If I wanted to wrestle Snyder or [Abdulrashid] Sadulaev, I would’ve gone to the Olympics. What’s the point?”

Chimaev never lacks confidence when talking about his plans to smash every fighter who opposes him in the UFC and through nine fights in the promotion that’s worked out very well for him.

But even Chimaev isn’t too proud to acknowledge that as dominant as he’s been mauling the majority of his opponents in the UFC, wrestling for MMA is far different than wrestling for Olympic gold.

“I didn’t spend years in the gym doing thousands and thousands of double-leg entries,” Chimaev said. “The last time I even worked on double-legs was [with Arman Tsarukyan] — Arman was just joking around. That was like seven, eight years ago the last time I really tried.

“That’s why MMA and wrestling are two completely different sports. I keep saying this but people don’t understand.”

Just after his RAF signing was announced, Chimaev took to Twitter and issued an open challenge for any top wrestler who wanted to come spar with him and he would offer a $200,000 reward if they survive.

For his part, Snyder knows he would be at the same exact disadvantage against Chimaev in the cage as Chimaev would be going against him on the wrestling mats.

“I saw he sent out some tweet about sparring with an Olympic champ and paying them $200,000,” Snyder told MMA Fighting. “He’s a good promoter and I think it will be fun to one day wrestle him, if he ever wants to.

“I don’t know what the rules were because if it was just one round, I don’t have any boxing or jiu-jitsu experience. I’d probably get pieced up in that way. But I don’t know. I don’t know what the rules are to it. Nonetheless, I’d just be interested in feeling what that’s like. He’s busy getting ready for the Strickland fight. He trains with Coach [Sam] Calavitta and I do a lot of work with him as well. Maybe one day we’ll link up but hopefully we’ll compete together against each other on RAF at some point. I love Khamzat. I love his competitive mentality. He just wants to dominate everybody. I like that attitude.”

Snyder’s desire to wrestle Chimaev really just comes down to his respect for the him and the way he’s torn through the vast majority of his competition in the octagon.

That said, Snyder doesn’t totally disagree with Chimaev on the odds being stacked against him in a wrestling match. For now, Snyder is staying focused on his next match at RAF 9 and gearing up for the World Championships while Chimaev prepares for Strickland at UFC 328.

But Snyder isn’t giving up hope that he might one day get the chance to challenge Chimaev in a wrestling match but he advises the UFC middleweight champion to get some practice before that ever happens.

love his competitive mentality. He just wants to dominate everybody. I like that attitude.”

“I think that before we wrestle, it would probably make sense for him to get some other matches underneath him and then we’ll see,” Snyder said. “I think that Izzy [Martinez] and Chad [Bronstein] are persuasive when it comes to matchups. Because I don’t think Urijah [Faber] was very excited about wrestling Arman but they’re persuasive so I think they could get it done.”