Thad Jean has a chance to cement himself as the welterweight tournament champion against Logan Storley in the PFL Smart Cage on August 1st amid a journey that began for Jean on the PFL Challenger Series. After punching his ticket to the main stage woith that CS bout, ‘The Silverback’ has been fighting in the PFL smart cage since 2023, and is seemingly poised to become one of the big standout stars under the Professional Fighters League umbrella.

When referencing a prior interview that the 2025 PFL tournament finalist did where he discussed how a win here could put him on a trajectory to become up there with Dakota Ditcheva as well as Francis Ngannou, Jean said,

“Yeah. It is exactly what it’s going to be. I want to be; I mean I guess Francis Ngannou is really high up there right now and Dakota is too, but I want to be one of the people that people, when they look at the PFL, they want [to] mention my name as well, you know what I mean? They also mention my name.”

“They don’t just mention Francis Ngannou, Dakota Ditcheva, [Paul] Hughes, [Johnny] Eblen, they don’t just mention these guys, but they also mention Thad Jean or ‘The Silverback’, you know what I mean? I just want to be; I’m going to be in the talks, not just because this year but I feel like this is my breakout year. You know what I mean? This is just the beginning. This is just the beginning.”

Thad Jean on 2025 successes and further growth in the future

While speaking of how this calendar year has been a massive period of growth for him but how it’s ultimately just the start, Thad Jean continued,

“So, I won’t say this year puts me on their level, but this year puts me on the trajectory to get to the level and then in future, will be getting past their level, if that if that makes sense to you. This is my breakout year, and I’m going to make sure this is the breakout year that people start to; mmm, let’s start looking.”

“Who is that guy? Let’s start looking him up. Oh, we know who that guy [is]. Oh, let’s go watch it. Oh, Thad Jean’s fighting. Let’s go watch it. You know what I mean? This is the year that I become a suspect on people’s radars.”