‘I had a lot to lose’: Cody Durden recounts crazy path to fighting and winning on 4 days’ notice at UFC Vegas 116

“So I left April 1 and went to Coconut Creek and two weeks ago they asked me to fight Ode Osbourne on July 11 and I was like perfect. Because I sat right next to him at UFC 327 and three days later they asked me to fight him.”

Durden barely started preparing for Osbourne when his manager called him with an entirely different offer that required him to fight much sooner than later.

“I was doing the meet and greet Saturday and Ali [Abdelaziz] hits me up and he’s like, ‘Hey Cody, they want you to fight May 9 versus Jafel Filho.’” Durden said. “I was like May 9, that’s three weeks. What about my other fight?

“I was like I’m in a bad situation, I can’t be taking short notice fights like this. I was like tell Mick [Maynard] I’ll do it but guarantee me one more. He came back and said, ‘Yeah, it’s a go.’”

With three weeks to prepare for UFC 328, Durden wasn’t in an ideal situation but he was confident he could get the job done.

Then everything turned upside down again.

“Sunday, I get texts and calls from the UFC about my flight and stuff and it’s April 25,” Durden said. “I’m like what’s going on? I call [Ali] and he’s like ‘don’t worry about it, it’s May 9.’ Then I told the UFC, I’m not fighting this weekend, I can’t make 125 [pounds] in five days.

“Ali calls me Monday and says, ‘I’m sorry, we made a mistake, this fight is this weekend, do you want it?’ I did some negotiation back and forth with Mick and I was just like f*ck it, why not? Hopped on a plane, left from Florida, went straight to Vegas, rallied up some cornermen.”

If three weeks’ notice was tough, fighting just four days later was anything but ideal.

Despite the odds being stacked against him and facing an opponent who had a full training camp to prepare, Durden gutted out a hard fought victory after three grueling rounds.

Based on the situation, Durden should have almost assuredly lost his fifth fight in a row, but instead he engaged in a back-and-forth battle before emerging victorious on the scorecards. Technically, he wasn’t fighting for his job, but the win definitely made him feel more secure about his future in the UFC.

“I had a lot to lose,” Durden said. “Got in there, I was patient. Just round-by-round, I went in there with a different mindset. My mind has always been kill or be killed and I’m always going after these guys and either I’m falling or they’re falling. Here recently it’s been me falling a lot. So I switched my game plan, switched my mindset to round-by-round and getting out there and just letting things come to me and not forcing things and it paid off big time.

“I had so much to lose. But they did guarantee me one more. It was like you get two chances to win instead of one. I really worked so hard. Leaving my family for months at a time and just living at the gym at [American Top Team] and just focused on training. But when the cage door locks, you have to make the right decisions in the cage just like you do outside of the cage. I felt like Saturday, it clicked for me. I felt at home. I wasn’t nervous. I wasn’t anxious. I wasn’t full of adrenaline. It was just a fight.”

The win put Durden back on track, but he certainly doesn’t want that feeling to go away so he’s already plotting his next move.

While he hasn’t officially heard word from the UFC, Durden feels like that fight against Osbourne at UFC 329 in July still makes sense and he’s more than willing to take it.

“I think I’m going to get a new contract and then fight Ode,” Durden said. “If they still want to go that Ode route, cool. If not, we’ll go another route. As long as I have security and get a new contract, I’ll fight anybody.

“I already train with Kyoji [Horiguchi] and [Alexandre] Pantoja everyday and they don’t get that good. Those guys are the best. What else can someone else do to me? I’ll fight anybody.”