James Krause says UFC declined his offer to fight Joaquin Buckley twice: “It’s dead in the water”

James Krause says the UFC matchmakers twice declined his offer to fight Joaquin Buckley, and he thinks the matchup’s “dead in the water” now.

Krause and Buckley have had tension for quite a while now due to previous issues at gyms in the Kansas City area, and both men have expressed interest in potentially fighting each other for several months. Calls for the fight became especially loud after Buckley knocked out Impa Kasanganay last fall with an insane head kick. However, the UFC did not book the fight between Buckley and Krause, instead choosing to match up Buckley with other opponents such as Jordan Wright and Alessio Di Chirico in an effort to build him into a contender at middleweight. Those efforts shot up into flames when Buckley himself was the victim of a brutal KO by di Chirico.

There was a ton of hype behind Buckley after he knocked out Kasanganay and Wright, but now that he’s lost to di Chirico and Kevin Holland in the UFC, a lot of people have question marks about him now. Speaking to Line Movement’s James Lynch, Krause said that he asked the UFC twice to fight Buckley but the promotion said no to the fight. While he would say yes if they offered it to him now, he doesn’t think it makes sense anymore.

“I’ve done all I can to ask for it. I’m past it. I can only ask for it so many times. I’ve asked for it twice, they said they didn’t want to make it happen. It wasn’t on his end, the UFC didn’t want to make it happen. I know for a fact they never asked the UFC for that fight, though,” Krause said. “The answer’s yes, I think it’s dead in the water. I haven’t heard anything else. I don’t see the point of it at this point. It doesn’t even make sense for anybody anymore. If it was ever thrown at me, I would for sure take it. But for me, it doesn’t make sense for a guy who is 2-2 in the UFC coming off of a knockout loss.”

James Krause himself is coming off of a decision victory over Claudia Silva on Fight Island and overall he has won seven of his last eight fights. We will see if the UFC is interested in a potential booking against Buckley at some point down the road, but at this point in time, the UFC matchmakers will likely look to give Buckley a bounce-back opponent next instead.