Not even a scary situation regarding previous weight cuts that prompted her to move from strawweight to flyweight for Saturday’s bout with JJ Aldrich has broken the armor of the Colorado native, making it a natural question to wonder if she ever gets nervous.

“Oh, all the time, like two hours ago” she laughs, answering without hesitation. “I get nervous about everything, but it’s hard to be nervous when you’re living a pretty amazing life.”

It has been amazing so far, with Barber announcing her arrival on the world stage with her July 2018 win over Jamie Colleen on Dana White’s Tuesday Night Contender Series, and then following it up with a second-round stoppage of Hannah Cifers in her UFC debut last November. All the while, “The Future” has made no secret of her desire to become the youngest champion in UFC history, and few are doubting that proclamation. 

“That’s pretty good, but I also expect it, and I believe it,” she said. “I believe that if you believe in something, other people will believe it, too. And when you hear something enough times, you’re going to start to believe it whether you want to or not. (Laughs) I feel it’s something that’s true, and if I just keep speaking it, people are eventually gonna decide to listen.”
 

Oh, they’re listening. Yep the remarkable aspects of this story is that a) they believe it and b) it doesn’t come off as cocky when Barber talks about her future plans.

That may come down to her obvious talent, but it also has to do with her personality. Though confident in her ability, when talking about other fighters, the level of admiration is clear. So there’s a respect for those ahead of her, as well as a confidence that she’s going to be alongside them soon.  A dangerous combination, especially at 20, and Barber is embracing it all.

“What kind of person is 20 years old – I don’t know many of them – gets to be on ESPN, gets to fight for the UFC, and I did a preview for an Amazon Prime movie? It’s pretty amazing. And nothing’s really gonna change that as long as I continue to do what I’ve been doing.”

She expects the ride to the top to continue in Nashville, but on the way to “Music City” was a rough spell that forced her ten pounds north in order to protect her health.

“It’s so hard for me to explain the damage that was done,” said Barber. “I can say it over and over and no one’s gonna really understand except for the professionals, like the people at the (UFC) PI (Performance Institute). “It messed up my hormones, it messed up my ability to burn calories, it messed up everything that I had going for me in terms of being able to cut weight.”

Barber hit her mark Friday with no issues, weighing in at 126 pounds for Saturday’s bout with Aldrich, and while it’s an ongoing process to get her to where she wants to be, she doesn’t rule out a return to 115 pounds. 

“I’m not in a rush to get back to 115,” she said. “But I just know that if my body was functioning properly, I’d be able to fight at 125 and 115. I know I can. I’ve done it before; it’s just that the process has to be done right.”
 

Not surprisingly, Barber is willing to do what it takes to get the job done, just like she’s been doing since turning pro in 2017. Even for this camp, in addition to dealing with the experts at the UFC PI, she got in work with her longtime coaches Marc Montoya and Matt Pena, as well as with the Roufusport squad and Izzy Martinez. All this, despite moving to Wisconsin with her family, a family she can’t wait to see this week, when the nerves would normally be at their highest.

“For this camp, I haven’t seen my family in almost three months,” said Barber. “I haven’t given my mom a hug, and the excitement for me to see her overpowers the nerves of anything. The fact that I get to see my younger brother and that I worked so hard for this amount of time and given up seeing them and being around everyone, I feel that more than I feel the nervousness. And anytime I do feel the nervousness, that just means you care. It means you take your job seriously.”

Maycee Barber has set the bar high for other 20-year-olds. And it’s very possible that she will be “The Future” in the UFC. She’s got all the ingredients for success. Or as she puts it, all the puzzle pieces. And we can’t wait to see the finished product.

“Life is like a puzzle,” she said. “You have those really good pieces, and when you put them into the puzzle, it makes it look that much better. And then you have the pieces that you don’t think did anything, but by the time you have all the pieces together, it looks like an amazing picture and a masterpiece. And even if that one crappy piece was missing, even though it was a crappy piece, the whole picture is missing something. Everything is a piece of the puzzle – the sad days, the good days, the bad days, the injuries, the wins, the losses. Those are all puzzle pieces, and if one of those things are missing in your puzzle, then it’s missing in your life and it’s missing in your story.”
 

“I was excited for the Almeida fight,” said Vera. “I was ready to go, and I was willing to bleed and willing to go crazy in there to make it happen for the fans. So, of course, I was looking forward to taking him out and taking his spot. He got hurt, nothing changed. I didn’t get sad, and the motivation is the same because it wasn’t meant to be.” 

And Vera still wanted to fight. He wished Almeida well for a speedy recovery and then let his manager know that he had no intention of giving his spot on the March 2 card up.

“They offered me a list of five names,” Vera said. “My answer was, ‘The first mother**ker to say they’ll take the fight, let’s go for that one. I don’t care who it is.’ They called me two days after with Frankie Saenz. He wasn’t on the list, but I said, ‘Let’s go.’ I know they have different styles, but I’m prepared, I’m in shape, and I’m willing to fight anybody because that’s the only way to get to the top. I’m not picking opponents or styles. I’ll fight whoever’s in front of me.”

So Vera vs Saenz it was, though not on March 2, as a fight week illness suffered by Vera pushed the bout to this Saturday’s card in Nashville. And whether in Nevada or Tennessee, the 26-year-old is hungry to out the gloves on and attempt to push his winning streak to three.

“It feels great, I’ve got good momentum, I feel motivated, I feel sharp and I just love to be active,” he said. “That, and being healthy, is the most important part for me.”

With ten fights already under his belt in the UFC, Vera has had a nice run in the Octagon, and after some starts and stops, a win over Saenz will set the stage for him to make his move on the 135-pound elite.

“Honestly, I’m chasing that momentum, and I want to make it happen this year,” he said. “I want to climb the rankings, I want to be able to put on big fights and be able to put on a show. A lot of people want to get to the top, but they don’t want to work for it. I’m working for it, so that when I get there, I will be prepared to perform and execute what I want.”

And though a big part of his motivation on the way up the ranks was to get the money for the surgery to treat his daughter’s Moebius syndrome, now that the surgery is done and Ana Paula is smiling, Vera has lost none of his hunger to succeed, not just for himself, but for his wife and three kids.
 

“It’s the same thing that motivated me when I started – my family, my kids,” he said. “The surgery is already done and it’s not a weight on my shoulders. I will never have to answer the question, ‘Dad, why did you never make it happen, why didn’t you raise the money?’ I won’t have that question, so I don’t have anything to torture me anymore. My heart is not sad anymore because I don’t see my daughter smiling the way my other two kids smile, so now my heart is warm, my mood is always positive, and my family’s doing good. I just keep the same drive as before the surgery, and it’s for my kids and providing what they need and making them happy and trying to make them the best people they can be, and go from there. And the drive is always there.”

That drive makes Marlon Vera a dangerous fighter, and nothing more needs to be said. But the Ecuador native is also a smart fighter, and he knows that sometimes a little pre-fight gamesmanship isn’t a bad thing. But as he points out, when it comes to his matchup with Saenz, it isn’t personal, just business.

“This is an entertainment business, so sometimes you have to put a little spice in the food to taste better, and I’m willing to put all the spice in there if I have to,” he said. “But I have zero feelings about. I’m not taking anything personal. He (Saenz) was free, I was free, so let’s fight. I expect he wants to make some money, so he will make one check that night, and I’m making two.”

“He’s a hard guy not to like,” said Pettis of Thompson. “We have a very similar story. We come from a traditional martial arts background, and he’s had some success in mixed martial arts with that style, so I think we’re similar fighters.”

They also look at the sport the same way these days. “Wonderboy” has always been a positive guy. Pettis had to regain that love after some tough times, but it’s back. 

“At this point in my life, I’m still training, I’m still having fun, and even doing this tour, I’m in Nashville, I’m a main event and I’m going from radio show to radio show. It’s a great life.”

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To make it back to this place is an accomplishment in itself for Pettis. When he stunned the world with his “Showtime” kick off the fence against Ben Henderson in their 2010 WEC bout, he was expected to be the sport’s next big thing. And after an upset loss to Clay Guida in his UFC debut in 2011, he lived up to those predictions, with blistering knockouts of Joe Lauzon and Donald Cerrone leading to a submission of Henderson in their 2013 rematch that earned him the UFC lightweight title. 

A coaching stint on The Ultimate Fighter, the cover of a Wheaties box and a win over Gilbert Melendez followed. 

Then it all fell apart. The loss of his title to Rafael Dos Anjos in 2015 began a three-fight skid, and all of a sudden, Pettis wasn’t just in a tough spot careerwise, but what got him into the sport in the first place was disappearing rapidly.

“I wasn’t used to losing,” he said. “I never lost like that – I was the invincible dude.” 

This sport will change that fast, but Pettis has fighting in his DNA, and he kept pressing, hoping success would change his outlook. He tried featherweight, but that didn’t work. A return to lightweight in 2017 was next, and while he’s split four fights, those four fights included two Fight of the Night bonuses and one Performance of the Night check. Most importantly, they included the fun again.

“I took a step back and looked at everything,” he said. “I thought about where I was at mentally and remembered the training camps behind the fights – I watched all my losses and I broke them down, studied the camps, and I just had some bad luck. The Max Holloway fight, my cars get blown up seven weeks before the fight. The Dustin Poirier fight I get a cut four weeks before the fight and I can’t spar for the rest of the camp. Little things weren’t adding up for me, but I’m not gonna stop until I get back to where I want to be at.” 

What Pettis wants is another world title, and in the process, he only wants big fights. That next fight is a literal big one, as he will fight at 170 pounds for the first time in the UFC against the No. 3-ranked Thompson.

“I always wanted to fight at 170 at some point,” said Pettis, who did fight at welterweight on the regional circuit before making his WEC debut. “I tried the ’45 cut and that’s something I never want to do again in my life. But now, especially for a guy like ‘Wonderboy,’ it’s an intriguing fight for me and I think I have the style and I have the skillset to beat the guy. I know how to beat the guy, and I saw that he was waiting for an opponent for a long time and I was in talks with my manager about fighting at 155 pounds, but I didn’t like the names and the options they were giving me. I’m fighting up, not backwards, so I said let’s take ‘Wonderboy.’ I took a chance, put it on social media, and here we are, the fight came through.”

For any fan of the art of striking, this is a dream fight, plain and simple. And credit goes to both men for taking it. There are high expectations, though. So high that even the hint of a takedown will be a disappointment.

“I’m not looking for any,” insists Pettis. “I’m looking to strike.”

Music to our ears, and facing a fellow striker on the sport’s biggest stage was music to Pettis’.

“I want tough fights, I want the guys that are gonna make me wake up in the morning and train my ass off, and he was there,” he said. “He’s ranked number three in the world at 170, this is my first fight at 170, let’s do it. That’s the type of stuff that wakes me up in the morning and makes me ready to go.”

Did he wonder if he was ever going to feel like this again?

“Most definitely,” Pettis said. “I think for a second I was so caught up in how I become a champion again and I forgot to enjoy the process. Even the (Tony) Ferguson fight, it didn’t go my way, but I had a blast. That wasn’t my best performance either. That was me on a five-week training camp. That was a last-minute fight they put together and I said, ‘Let’s go do it.’”

“Let’s go do it.” It’s the mantra Anthony Pettis is living by again, and while he’s already written a compelling story, the next chapter might end up being better than the first.
 
“I think my life’s been a fight,” he said. “Everybody knows my story and how I grew up, and these trials have to happen to see how strong you really are. And I’ve never thought about quitting once. I definitely thought that the joy and the love wasn’t the same, but it’s come around. I’m 32 years old and I feel like I’m the hungriest I’ve ever been. I’m watching film, I’m studying, I’m waking up early and I feel like I’ve matured now. As a young kid, I was out there not even knowing what I was doing and I became who I was really quick. I was a world champion, Wheaties box, and all that stuff and I didn’t know what I was doing. I have way more skills at my age now, way more knowledge, and this time around, I’m gonna hold this belt.”