Less talk, more fight for Kevin Holland at UFC on ABC 2

Kevin Holland’s brash personality and habit of talking throughout his fights combined with an impressive winning streak in 2020 to make him a fan favorite and media darling. Then he lost.

The 28-year-old quickly found out the traits people loved so much when he was winning were the ones that drew the most criticism when he wasn’t.

“Everybody wanted big mouth until big mouth failed. Now they don’t want big mouth anymore,” Holland said of his reaction to a March 20 loss by unanimous decision to Derek Brunson.

Holland will look to bounce back when he meets middleweight Marvin Vettori in the main event of Saturday afternoon’s UFC on ABC 2 card at the Apex.

The bout headlines a main card on ABC at noon that also features a women’s strawweight bout between Mackenzie Dern and Nina Nunes, the wife of two-division champion Amanda Nunes who formerly competed as Nina Ansaroff.

The Holland-Vettori clash will be the quickest turnaround between two main event fights in UFC history as Holland hopes to wipe away the memory of what happened in the same venue.

Holland was taken down repeatedly in that fight, though true to form, he was incessantly talking while on his back to Brunson for long stretches and to lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, who was seated cageside and laughed at the monologue on several occasions.

The audience — and UFC president Dana White — was not as entertained.

Holland, a breakout star with five wins in five 2020 fights, was greeted with some nasty social media messages when he finally checked his phone.

“No regrets for talking to Khabib, no regrets for people being upset, no regrets for anything,” said Holland, who believes most of the people who were angry were just upset because they bet on him and lost. “It didn’t bother me too much. At the end of the day, you know what you’re getting yourself into in the MMA game. They can say what they want to say and do what they want to do. They don’t pay me and none of them would say it to my face.”

The criticism from White, who said all the talking and laughing during a fight he was losing made it look as if Holland was having a “mental breakdown,” was not as easy to shake for Holland, who had been called entertaining by White on several occasions during the winning streak.

“Dana wasn’t happy and I can understand why,” Holland said. “He’s the boss and he was looking forward to me doing certain things to Brunson to bring better revenue. I don’t think Brunson brings any revenue to the game or the sport, so I can feel why he was upset. … I understand where (White) is coming from. He’s had things to say and best believe I have open ears.”

It was part of the reason Holland wanted to get back in the cage so soon and jumped at the chance when Vettori’s original opponent, Darren Till, had to pull out of the fight last week.

Holland says he understands business largely because he was raised by his grandparents, who owned a company. Perhaps that’s why he’s so eager to please his boss. To do that, he believes he has to win back the fans that turned on him after the loss.

Holland says he plans on dialing back the frequency of his chatter, though it won’t go away. He thinks what people now want to see is if he can bounce back with a win, not how much he can talk while doing it. That’s what he plans to do on Saturday.

“It does matter what people want because what people want is what pays the bills,” he said. “The more fans tune in, the more fans are happy, the more money the company makes and the more I could possibly make. I’m a company man. If people like me, it’s good for business. If they don’t, it’s bad. I want the people to like me.”

Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on Twitter.