UFC legend Shogun Rua released a statement following his TKO loss to Paul Craig at UFC 255, admitting he is considering retirement from MMA.
In the opening fight on the UFC 255 pay-per-view main card, Rua suffered the sixth loss of his career by TKO in a devastating fashion. After a somewhat competitive first round, Craig took Rua down and rained down punches in the second round, forcing the legend to tap to strikes. It was a vicious finish and it’s the kind of violent stoppage that made UFC president Dana White comment that he hopes Rua considers finally retiring from MMA.
Rua is 37, which isn’t that old compared to several other fighters from the PRIDE era such as Anderson Silva and Fedor Emelianenko who continue to fight. But Rua has been taking a lot of damage in his last few fights, and the wear-and-tear is showing. Taking to social media following the loss to Craig, Rua admitted that he suffered an injury in the fight, and following the loss, he will sit down with his family and make a decision about retirement. He also shared a photo of his elbow, which appears to be badly injured.
“Unfortunately things didn’t go out the way I would have liked last night, and this is a part of our sport. I suffered an injury to my elbow on the first time I was taken down, but this serves as no excuse, as it is part of fighting and it doesn’t take way any merits from my opponent. An athletes’ career is not only made of glory and thank God I was already blessed many times with the reward of victory, due to a lot of sacrifices and effort, that only those who live our everyday routine really knows what we go through,” Rua wrote.
“I want to thank all the amazing support from you guys, as always. I’m blessed for being able to do this for 18 years already, and here in 2020 you guys are the great motivation I carry with me, and that it makes me continue this far. Now I’m going to rest with my family, and think about my career. I know that my mission in this sport goes way beyond the octagon as well. Thanks a lot guys.”
A former UFC champion and a former PRIDE champion, Rua is also one-half of one of the best MMA fights of all time against Dan Henderson back at UFC 139. He is a lock for the UFC Hall of Famer if and when he retires. Although he has two fights left on his current UFC deal, based on his comments it doesn’t appear that he will fulfill those last two bouts.
Do you think Shogun Rua should retire?