Cannonier could fight Costa at UFC 301

"Initially, the management offered me a fight with Paulo Costa at UFC 301, but I received permission from doctors to participate in the tournament only at the end of March. So I would have only had a month to prepare for the fight. I didn't want to go back to fighting without proper preparation because I needed to tighten up my wrestling. Also, my knee hadn't fully recovered yet. It wasn't something I wanted to do. Of course, my goal is a contender fight against some of the highly ranked guys. I had hopes of fighting Costa a little later in June, but they gave it to Strickland," Middle Easy quoted Jared as saying.