Shane Burgos knows his PFL 6 fight against Yamato Nishikawa is do-or-die for his season.
Burgos left the UFC last year and proceeded to sign with PFL, competing at lightweight as part of their tournament format. Unfortunately, in his debut, ‘Hurricane’ suffered a decision loss to Olivier Aubin-Mercier. The setback was disappointing, but Burgos is just glad he gets to fight again so soon.
“It was nice, I enjoyed focusing more on training and performance than focusing on my weight. 145, the last three weeks are all about making the weight and getting as low as I can and not about how sparring is going,” Burgos said on Just Scrap Radio on BJPENN.com. “I definitely learned a lot from that fight. He did a good job at taking the fight out of it and making it more of a competition, just holding and stalling. I understand why he did it because we are fighting again 10 weeks later, but a learning lesson.”
Once the first fight was over, the PFL announced Shane Burgos would face Yamato Nishikawa in his final regular season matchup. Although Burgos wasn’t familiar with his opponent at all, he knows that adds pressure to him as everyone expects him to win.
“I wasn’t familiar with him at all until his fight with Clay Collard and then obviously got familiar with him since finding out I was fighting him… When you get these matchups when not many people know them, there is more pressure,” Burgos said. “Going into my last one there was pressure but going into this one, there is even more pressure because everyone is like you are going to win this one. Like, yeah I am going to win this one but let’s not act like he is no pushover, his back is against the wall just like mine is. I’m not taking him lightly and looking at this as an easy fight at all.”
Ultimately, pressure or not, Shane Burgos knows he can’t just win this fight, but needs to stop Yamato Nishikawa early if he is going to make the playoffs.
With both Burgos and Nishikawa needing early finishes, ‘Hurricane’ is expecting a fan-friendly fight for however it long it lasts.
“If I just skate by and get a decision win, I’m out and not going to make the playoffs. It does add more incentive to fight more aggressively but he’s in the same exact position. But, that excites me because he is trying to kill me and I am trying to kill him and it makes it fireworks,” Burgos concluded.
