Mark Hunt calls Brock Lesnar a 'pretender,' says he'll 'knock his face off'

Brock Lesnar will make his return to mixed martial arts (MMA) at UFC 200 on July 9, 2016, in Las Vegas, Nevada where he'll take on Mark Hunt in his first taste of MMA action dating back to 2011. That means the lion's share of the publicity surrounding the match-up will go to the WWE star, but his opponent is a good quote in his own right.

On his website, Hunt gave the following comments on the upcoming showdown between the two heavyweights:

“I already said they better be testing him, but in the end it doesn’t even matter. It’s time for ‘punch face’, a game I have been playing for many years. I’ll knock his face off. I knock his mouth off and then his lips fly off. ... I ain’t no part time fighter. He thinks this is a game where he can come back and forth. I will send this pretender back so he can play house with the other part timers. This realm is for the real fighters, not these damn pretenders.”

Hunt represents a difficult match-up for Lesnar in that he's got huge punching power and is well known for his spectacular knockouts. Brock believes his shortcomings in his last couple outings in the Octagon, two technical knockout losses to Cain Velasquez and Alistair Overeem, respectively, had more to do with his battling through multiple bouts of diverticulitis.

We'll find out soon enough.