Paulo Filho gave his thoughts on the fight to Tatame. com and spoke on the weight issue:
The fight was more or less like I predicted, I knew he’d start with everything standing, but I managed to defend myself and I knew he’d get tired and I’d put my ground game on him. Thanks God everything was alright, he didn’t hit any strong punch that could make me knock me off, so I passed the guard, mounted and submitted with the arm-lock, my specialty.
Then the weight issue:
I came here thinking that this fight would be at 205lbs, so I came with my regular weight, around 204. When got here, three days before the fight, my manager told me that we’d probably fight at 185 division. It was very hard, but my head was good and thanks god I made weight comfortably.
It's hard to fathom that fighters and their managers agree to fights without knowing definitively what weight the fight will be at. Then again, this isn't the first case of fighters going over to Japan having things switched around at the last minute either. I know Filho was having problems making weight while he fought for the WEC promotion. It's encouraging that he was able to lose the 20lbs in three days, which signals that at least his head is somewhat back in the game. I look forward to his next fight to see how he progresses.
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