UFC 290: 'Basic' Yair Rodriguez wants to turn lessons learned from Max Holloway into title win over Alex Volkanovski

The featherweight champions in the UFC since it added the division in 2010 are probably the best of any class in the UFC.

Jose Aldo is already in the UFC Hall of Fame and Conor McGregor, Max Holloway and Alex Volkanovski will undoubtedly join him when their careers are over.

There are no mediocre champions among that group, and given how stacked with talent the division remains, there's little chance of that occurring any time soon.

Nearly 10 years after he joined the UFC, Yair Rodriguez has an opportunity to add his name to that list of legends. He holds the interim featherweight title after an impressive submission of Josh Emmett in Australia in February, and on Saturday at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas he will face champion Volkanovski in a unification bout in the main event of UFC 290.

It's been a long journey with plenty of potholes along the way, but Rodriguez has come so far that as he awaits to fight a long-reigning champion who some regard as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world, he's oozing confidence.

Asked about challenges that Volkanovski presents, Rodriguez doesn't mince words. Many in his situation lather the champion with praise, and while Rodriguez clearly respects Volkanovski — "How can you not given what he has accomplished already?" Rodriguez asked rhetorically — he isn't about to sugarcoat things, either.

"I think he has holes in his game," Rodriguez said. "I've been watching his fights, and I've been finding a couple of things he always does. I'm going to capitalize on those things he does."

Rodriguez believed in his talents early on and felt that given a shot, he'd be able to prove to the world what he's always felt. It was a loss, though, that convinced him he was firmly on the right track.

Not long after he lost to Holloway in a Fight of the Night battle in Las Vegas on Nov. 13, 2021, Rodriguez was sitting in the back of an ambulance waiting to be checked out at a local hospital. Holloway walked out of Apex and immediately headed to the ambulance, where the back doors were open.

"Yair, you frickin' animal," Holloway exclaimed, beaming.

As he walked away to make his own trip to be checked out, Holloway said to no one in particular, "The guy is phenomenal."

That was high praise coming from a fighter of Holloway's stature, who's still regarded by many as the greatest featherweight in MMA history.

Rodriguez said the Holloway fight showed him he was on the right track.

"That fight especially pushed me forward," Rodriguez said. "The level of competition that Max Holloway brings is amazing. Everything he does is [great]. There's no way I could ever talk bad about Max. And that fight helped me because it showed me what it took to win at this [level]."

Eight months after losing to Holloway, Rodriguez demonstrated what the loss did for him. He faced Brian Ortega, an elite featherweight whose only losses were to, coincidentally enough, Volkanovski and Holloway, and put a severe beating on him.

Ortega injured a shoulder early in the bout and absorbed a severe pummeling before the fight was stopped late in the first.

That earned him a shot at the interim title against Emmett, though Rodriguez wasn't all that thrilled to get an interim title shot. He fought on the same card in Perth, Australia, as Volkanovski, who challenged lightweight champion Islam Makhachev in order to attempt to become a double champion. Rodriguez would have preferred not to go the interim route.

"Honestly, I felt it would have been the best thing to go straight to the champion," said Rodriguez, who gave the best performance of his illustrious career in submitting Emmett in the fourth round. "With all due respect to my opponent, Josh, I always knew that I could beat him. That's why I didn't want to take that fight and wanted to go straight to fighting the current champion.

"But the UFC offered it to me and this is what I had to do to get the fight I really wanted, so I accepted the fight with Josh Emmett. But I always knew I could beat him and I just did what I had trained to do."

Rodriguez said his visibility and pay have increased after winning the interim belt. UFC president Dana White often decries what he calls "the cling-ons," the hangers-on who attach themselves to a fighter after he or she becomes successful.

Rodriguez chuckled when asked if his newly found fame as an interim champion would impact him.

"I'm really basic, you know?" he said. "I'm basic, basic, basic. I don't spend much money. I like to invest it in property and things like that. When an opportunity arises, I like to take advantage and invest because I know I'm not going to be able to do this the rest of my life. To me, I love that the money will allow me to take care of my family.

"But I'm not a crazy guy spending and partying. I don't love to do that. What I love to do is train and fight and compete. That's what motivated me at the beginning and it's what still motivates me now."