Brent Primus is set to defend his lightweight belt against Michael Chandler at Bellator 212 on Dec. 14 (Poster Credit: Bellator MMA)

Bellator heads to Hawaii next week for back-to-back nights of action on Dec. 14 and 15. In the main event on Friday’s “Salute the Troops” show, Brent Primus (8-0) is set to make his first title defence against two-time lightweight champ Michael Chandler (18-4). This fight is a rematch of their Bellator NYC contest in June of 2017, which ended in a doctor’s stoppage due to an ankle injury to Chandler at 2:22 of the first round.

A rematch was originally scheduled for Bellator 197; however, Primus was forced to withdraw from the fight due to a knee injury. While he would have preferred taking the fight at an earlier date, he says it was Chandler who was reluctant in the first place.

“What’s crazy is like I was supposed to fight him months and months before I got injured,” said Primus when speaking to Fight Night Picks’ Craig Allen on Thursday. “I got a call from Bellator, they gave me a date, they gave me a time and they just said ‘we’re waiting on Chandler’ and then they called me a few weeks later and they said ‘Chandler doesn’t want to fight you, he wants to fight Yamauchi instead so just hold on and we’ll get you that rematch soon’.”

“I’ve literally been waiting on Chandler for freaking forever you know? I did get injured which sucked but I was only out for a couple months but other than that I’ve been waiting for this dude.”

Bellator NYC featured Chandler and Primus’ first encounter, resulting in Primus’ victory due to Chandler suffering a freak ankle injury (Media Source: Bellator MMA YouTube)

Over the course of the past few months and weeks leading up to this fight, further magnified by Chandler’s interview on this past week’s episode of The MMA Hour. When asked how he felt about the way Chandler was handling his media duties in the build up to their fight, Primus says he’s not concerned with it.

“I even don’t even care,” said Primus. “I don’t care what this guy says, he literally just makes up stuff and just lies.”

“I’m not really worried about what he says honestly ’cause everything he says is a bunch of bull crap.”

Training camp for Primus has been injury-free, working with the likes of recently signed Bellator welterweight Austin Vanderford at a combination of gyms including Gracie Barra Portland.

“This training camp has been awesome man,” said Primus. “Like it’s crazy ’cause there’s been like, oh man, I think two out of my last three fights I’ve been injured pretty bad.”

“Even when I went and fought Chandler I had a torn knee and I had a busted rib and my cartilage was torn. And if it wasn’t for a title fight I probably would have backed out of that fight ’cause I was really beat up. And, umm, this time I’m a hundred percent man, I’m ready, I’m locked and loaded.”

The highly anticipated rematch couldn’t come soon enough for Primus, who’s been out of action since gaining the title last summer. When asked what the fans could expect in the fight coming up on Dec. 14, this is what he had to say.

(Poster Credit: Bellator MMA Twitter)

For the full interview with Brent Primus, as well as Ed Ruth, and Daniel Crawford be sure to check out this week’s episode of Fight Night Picks tomorrow on YouTube!