Joe Lauzon is glad he and Donald Cerrone will finally be sharing the Octagon together.
Lauzon and Cerrone were supposed to fight at UFC 274 on May 7, but on the morning of the event, ‘Cowboy’ had to pull out as he fell ill. Immediately, the promotion began looking to get the fight rebooked and the two will now meet at UFC Austin. For Lauzon, he says he still got paid for the canceled fight.
“They gave me my show money and the Venum money which is a good amount,” Lauzon said on Just Scrap Radio on BJPENN.com. “But, it’s not even about that, it’s obviously nice it’s better to get the money than not. It’s just so emotionally draining like that’s the big thing, I wasn’t fighting this time because I needed the money, I do well at my gym. It’s not my full-time job like it had been in the past. It’s great to get the money because I put in over three months of work but it was more about the fight not happening.”
Not only is Lauzon glad the fight got rebooked so quickly, but he’s also glad it remains in front of fans. The hope was to get this fight done ASAP, but after hearing about a Boston card in August he figured the UFC may delay the fight until then which he didn’t want to happen.
“I’m glad it’s in front of fans and before it was on pay-per-view and now it’s on a Fight Night so it’s easier for people to watch it,” Lauzon said. “I’m excited about it, I’m glad the fight is actually happening now, I’m glad it’s not so far out, it’s better than doing it in August, that would’ve been crappy if they made us the main event in Boston in August or something.”
Given Joe Lauzon already spent an entire training camp preparing for Donald Cerrone and coming up with a game plan, he says nothing really changes on his end. Instead, the plan remains to blitz Cerrone early and hopefully find the stoppage before Cowboy can get going.
“Nothing really changes too much, there were some things that we were working on towards the end of camp that we maybe I wasn’t doing as well as we would’ve liked so we threw it away,” Lauzon said. “Now we have more time so I’m sure we will add in some of those things but nothing changes too much, it’s overall the same game plan… I don’t think I can start slow if I wanted to, I think we are going to get after him, he starts slow and I start fast. Just get after him, that’s not so much a game plan but rather what will just happen.”
If Lauzon does just that and gets the stoppage win, he says he isn’t sure what his future holds but isn’t ruling out fighting on the Boston card.
“We will see how it goes, if we do well in the Cowboy fight and I still want to do this after, we will think about the Boston card,” Lauzon concluded. “If we do really well against Cowboy, I’ll definitely entertain opponents for the Boston card. I’m always taking it one fight at a time.”
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