Diego Brandao wants to be a UFC fighter again.
Brandao spent years of his life competing in Russia and other countries in that area of the world, sometimes outside his original weight class, and saw his record drop from 20-11, when he left the UFC in 2016, to 29-22 this year.
At that point, he had enough.
A UFC veteran and Ultimate Fighter reality show winner, Brandao decided to “fix my life” and leave those promotions and return to North America, all to prove a point. The 38-year-old wanted to show the world he could still be in the UFC, and to prove it, he agreed to face any prospect in the United States.
Brandao fought 12-2 featherweight talent Jamie Siraj in March and won via first-round knockout, a spinning wheel kick that went viral and earned him the Tuff-N-Uff belt. This past Sunday, four miles away from where Ilia Topuria shocked the world at UFC 317, Brandao once again won by wheel kick knockout to successfully defend his belt against a much younger Contender Series veteran in Canaan Kawaihae.
“I think the UFC is going to call,” Brandao told MMA Fighting on Tuesday night. “We’ll talk to them tomorrow and see what they thought [of the fight]. Sean Shelby was there but people wouldn’t leave him be, there was a bunch of people around him, so he left before the co-main event.”
AND STILL!
— Tuff-N-Uff MMA (@tuffnuff) June 30, 2025
Diego Brandao defends his featherweight title with a brutal, hard-fought TKO over Canaan Kawaihae in the #TNU145 main event!
The UFC vet shows championship grit once again and remains the king at 145 #MMA | #FutureStarsOfMMA | #UFCFightPass | #LasVegasFights pic.twitter.com/z7kTQ3CjTj
Brandao said that Shelby, the UFC matchmaker, was the reason why he decided to quit fighting in Russia.
“I left the Russian money because I went to Las Vegas and asked Sean Shelby what was missing for me to be back [to the UFC],” Brandao said. “[He said] ‘Diego, leave Russia and fight in your weight class. Knock three people out and call me.’ [I said] ‘F*ck, why didn’t you tell me that a while ago?’ First fight, killed the man. Second one, boom, it’s over. The man said three fights? Let’s go. My head is on that third fight because Sean Shelby is a man of his word. He said that, so he’ll do what he said.
“Dana White has already cleared me [to go back], but Sean Shelby is the deal. I know Dana White can put me back there if he wants to, but there’s a process. Dana White won’t open the doors for me because he knows how I am, my past. ‘I’ll put Diego here easily and he can mess things up. No, let me see if he really wants it. Let him work.’ I believe that’s how Dana thinks. And I’m not as important as Conor McGregor to call Dana White like that.
“And I like this way, to fight, because that’s how you appreciate things. If I have to fight a third fight, I’ll go for it with hunger because then they will see and know it. They want to see me like that, in a war, fighting, because they won’t just put him back in there like that. They know who I am, they know I need to work hard to value it. They know that.”
Brandao said he has changed a lot compared to his old UFC days, more mature as an athlete and a man. Away from out-of-the-cage drama and beating prospects left and right, Brandao said he likely defends his Tuff-N-Uff featherweight belt in November if the UFC calls doesn’t come sooner, and it would be against UFC, Bellator and PFL veteran Kai Kamaka III.
“Hawaii, BJ [Penn] is the only one from there that beats me, when we trained together,” Brandao said. “The others, no chance. I’ll finish him.”
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