Here are some of the highlights from a recent interview between Tapology's Steven Kelliher and Jorge Gurgel, who fights next week in the main event of Strikeforce's Challengers card on Showtime.  Gurgel is a great guy to interview.

Tapology: You have been training in Boston with Mark Delagrotte for your last few fights. Have you mainly been working your striking there, since you are already very accomplished on the ground?

Gurgel: Yeah, I work everything here. Of course Mark is a Muay Thai expert, but he emphasizes the MMA aspects, such as mixing Muay Thai with trips, takedowns, elbows and all of that. Once I get on the bottom I go on autopilot from there.

Tapology: Your fans have been hard on you in the past for refusing to take fights to the ground where it is presumed you would have a distinct advantage. How do you feel about that argument?

Gurgel: I am better on the ground (laughs). If I had a dollar for every time somebody said, "Jorge, why don’t you take people down and use your Jiu-Jitsu?" I would be a rich man. I think it’s just that I enjoy Muay Thai very much, I love the art, and I have a lot of confidence in my stand-up. I don’t know man, I just simply like to fight and enjoy my job. If a guy wants to take the fight to the ground, that’s good too, but I’m just not going to force the issue—let’s put it that way. I know I am more effective on the ground, but I have too much fun standing up. Maybe when people get sick of me standing up I will take somebody down and submit them real quick and say, "Is everybody happy now?"

Tapology: At this point in your career, do you think you are going to concentrate more on winning rather than putting on a show for the fans?

Gurgel: People always think I fight that way to put on a show for the fans, but no, I fight that way because I like it. When I was released from the UFC, I saw Dana [White] at an event, and he said, "I know there were politics behind your release, but I knew that every time I saw you on one of my fight cards, it was going to be a great fight." I said, "Thank you Dana. I still lost my job, didn’t I?" We both laughed and he said, "You’ll come back around."

Tapology: What do you think about Billy Evangelista as an opponent? What problems does he pose for you?

Gurgel: He seems to be a very respectful guy, which I appreciate. He is a very dangerous and worthy opponent—the best guy I have fought so far—so I really have nothing bad to say about him. We both want the same thing, and we are both going to come prepared. It’s going to be a fight that people will be talking about for a long time.

Tapology: How big would it be for you to get onto a CBS card?

Gurgel: Are you ****ing serious? Rephrase that question before I bitch smack you. It would be very nice. I’ll get there eventually, but the only thing in my mind right now is beating the piss out of Billy Evangelista, with all due respect. I have been through pretty much everything a mixed martial artist can go through in a ten year career, so everything that comes my way now is a bonus. When a guy has been through everything, I think it is just a bad matchup for anyone. I think now is a bad time to fight me. Billy Evangelista is only undefeated for a few more weeks.

The full interview with a bunch of additional questions can be found here.