Costa’s brutal taunt

Paulo Costa turned a routine fight-week interview into a clip reel when he unloaded on Azamat Murzakanov in Miami before UFC 327, calling him fat and mocking the “secret juice” line that had already become part of their pre-fight back-and-forth. The matchup is set for April 11, 2026, at Kaseya Center, with Costa and Murzakanov listed as the co-main event on the official card. (ufc.com, mmajunkie.usatoday.com) This wasn’t random trash talk between strangers. Costa is a former Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight title challenger moving up to light heavyweight, and Murzakanov is an unbeaten light heavyweight contender entering the week with a 16-0 record. (ufc.com, ufc.com, sports.yahoo.com) The “secret juice” line matters because it gave Costa a ready-made target. Reports from fight week say Murzakanov had hinted that people would soon see “what Russians have” and what the “secret” was, and Costa answered by turning that into an accusation about performance enhancers without making a formal claim. (agentmma.com, mmajunkie.usatoday.com) That exchange landed because Costa has built a reputation on saying outrageous things in English that sound half-scripted and half-improvised. In this case, multiple outlets and clips from media day pushed the same soundbite, which is why the insult traveled faster than any technical breakdown of the fight. (mmajunkie.usatoday.com, youtube.com, youtube.com) Under the noise, the fight is a real test for Costa because he is leaving the 185-pound middleweight division for the 205-pound light heavyweight division. The official Ultimate Fighting Championship athlete page lists him in light heavyweight now, and his last recorded win on that page came against Roman Kopylov on July 19, 2025. (ufc.com) For Murzakanov, the stakes are even cleaner. He entered fight week as a ranked light heavyweight with an unbeaten record, and he told reporters a win over Costa would put him “very, very close” to a title shot in a division that suddenly looks open. (ufc.com, mmajunkie.usatoday.com, sports.yahoo.com) The card around them explains why this co-main event got extra oxygen. UFC 327 is headlined by Jiří Procházka against Carlos Ulberg for the light heavyweight title, so Costa-Murzakanov sits directly under a championship fight in the same weight class. (ufc.com, espn.com) That makes Costa’s taunt more than a random insult. He is trying to crash a new division, Murzakanov is trying to protect an unbeaten run, and one ugly quote about being “fat” and using “secret juice” became the fastest way to tell casual fans why this undercard fight suddenly feels attached to the belt. (ufc.com, sports.yahoo.com, mmajunkie.usatoday.com)