Veteran UFC fighter Michael Chiesa has confirmed that his next fight against Carlston Harris at UFC Fight Night 271 in Seattle, Washington will be his last before retiring from the sport.

“Yeah, this is my last fight,” Chiesa confirmed on the Anik & Florian Show this week. “I’ve been kind of on the fence about it. It’s a hard decision to make. I had my first fight when I was 20 years old in 2008. All good things come to an end. I wanted to fight out this contract. I just signed a new deal before the Court McGee fight. That was my plan: ‘I’m going to fight out this deal, then I’m done.’ It’s not like I want to go into free agency – I love where I’m at. I love the UFC. I have no reason to want to go fight anywhere else. I want to fight the best guys in the world. The best guys in the world are right here, and I’ve been competing with them for 14 years.

“But when they said they’re going back to Seattle – it’s my 22nd UFC fight, 22 is my number, March 28 in my parents’ anniversary. It’s like the universe is telling me something.”

The 38-year-old Chiesa is actually on a three-fight winning streak heading into his swan song in Seattle, having beaten Tony Ferguson, Max Griffin and Court McGee over the past couple of years.

Despite that, the former TUF Season 15 winner is not currently ranked in the welterweight division, with a three-fight losing slump a few years ago against the likes of Vicente Luque, Sean Brady and Kevin Holland having halted a previous push up the 170lb ladder.

In total, Chiesa holds a 14-7 record in the UFC, with some of his other big-name wins coming against the likes of Neil Magny, Rafael dos Anjos, Diego Sanchez, Carlos Condit, Beneil Dariush and Jim Miller.

Alongside his fighting career in the Octagon, Chiesa has also regularly appeared as an analyst on UFC pre and post-fight broadcasts in recent years, giving him a potential career path to follow once he hangs up his gloves.