Chris Weidman believes that “bad juju” from his gruesome injury at UFC 261 played a part in Weili Zhang’s title loss to Rose Namajunas.
Weidman (15-6 MMA), a former UFC middleweight champion, squared off with perennial division contender Uriah Hall on April 24 in Jacksonville. The contest lasted all of seventeen seconds, as the first kick that Chris threw was checked by Hall and resulted in ‘The All American’ breaking his leg.
It was a shocking injury and one which resulted in Chris Weidman having two surgeries to try and repair his broken leg.
Shortly after Weidman was stretchered out of the arena at UFC 261, Weili Zhang made her walk to the Octagon in hopes of defending her title against former strawweight title holder Rose Namajunas.
Unfortunately for the Chinese standout, things did not go her way against ‘Thug Rose’ and she wound up losing her strap following a nasty head-kick KO.
According to Weili Zhang, she lost her focus after witnessing Weidman’s brutal injury that evening in Florida.
“The fighter in my previous fight, who was in the same waiting room as me (Weidman), his leg was snapped. I even touched gloves with him when he left for the fight, and I said ‘good luck’. I saw his leg snapped like that. I felt like my mind wasn’t completely focused on the match,” Zhang said (h/t South China Morning Post). “I wasn’t as focused. You can’t lose focus for even 0.01 seconds. No, no. It’s that cruel.”
During a recent interview, Chris Weidman was asked to share his thoughts on Weili Zhang’s recent comments and he seemed onboard with her explanation.
“Yeah, I gave her the bad juju,” Weidman told Ariel Helwani (via MMAFighting). “I remember hanging out with her in the locker room and you know you’ve got to give people good energy and good vibes, I remember her giving the fist pound right before I went out and yeah, I mean listen that was a super traumatic moment for me and I think anybody who watched, people in the stands and stuff, people want to compare with Conor McGregor [at UFC 264]. His was kind of over time, it slowly happened and he stepped back and it broke. Mine was, we weren’t even sweating yet, there was no adrenaline going, I was fresh. It was the first strike of the fight, full force, everything I have, and it was traumatic I think for everybody to see it.”
Chris Weidman continued to discuss how is injury likely played a factor in the Weili Zhang vs. Rose Namajunas title fight at UFC 261.
“Listen, I think it would probably mess with anybody a little bit, but that being said, you don’t want to make excuses like that. I’m sure Rose—I’m friends with Rose, I love Rose—I’m sure she was upset when she saw me do that, but you’ve got to get right back to getting in your own head and being ready for your own fight.”
‘The All American’ continued:
“Completely understandable, and I’m sure she’s being asked questions on why, and she’s just trying to figure out reasons on why she lost,” Weidman said. “A hundred percent that’s something that was in her head and something that she thought about. It wasn’t positive. You want positive vibes, you’re walking out, there’s a lot of negative thoughts you’re trying to deal with. To have to deal with something like that definitely sucks. It’s not like she’s lying saying that rattled her. I believe her 100 percent.”