Dominick Reyes has a name and date for his next opponent lined up in Volkan Oezdemir at UFC London on March 2nd, but this was not the opponent Reyes initially desired, that honor would belong to Anthony Smith. Anthony Smith will now be challenging Jon Jones for the light heavyweight championship at UFC 235 instead, but Reyes still has his gaze set on “Lionheart” after the way Smith responded to his challenge.

“I didn’t have any fights set up,” Reyes told BJPenn.com. “Looking for a fight, he was available. So I said, ‘Hey, man. You say you’re training on the off season. Let’s fight in February or March,’ and then he got all up in arms about it because he had this whole plan to not fight anybody until he fights Jones or Gustafsson and apparently his plan paid off for him.

“I have four wins in light heavyweight. He has three. So I was like ‘Hey, man. This will be a good fight. People want to see this. Let’s do it.’ I mean, I think so.”

Even though Dominick Reyes is not a fan of Smith’s response to his fight proposal, he has no choice but to admit that Smith’s approach ultimately paid off for Smith. He also fears that this payoff might send Smith into an early retirement.

“I think this is Anthony just getting paid before he’s done, to be honest,” Reyes said. “I mean, I’m hoping he doesn’t retire after this fight because I still got a bone to pick with the guy, but we’ll see.”