Daniel Cormier believes his loss to Stipe Miocic at UFC 241 was one of the biggest comebacks of 2019.
Early on in the fight, Daniel Cormier was having a ton of success where many thought he won all three rounds. Yet, in the fourth-round, Miocic started to attack the body and ultimately earned a TKO win. It was a massive comeback that ‘DC’ says was because of a great adjustment from Miocic and his corner.
“From my [point of view], honestly being in there, and credit to Miocic and his corners. You know, you watch the fight and you go to the corners and he’s confused. They are telling him to do things and he is saying I’m trying. Like he is confused as everybody else,” Daniel Cormier said on UFC’s best of 2019 show on Fight Pass. “But, he hit me with a number of right hands all fight. Whatever just a right hand that’s nothing. But, once they go to the body and go to the body and go to body, it allowed for him, even early in the fourth round, he’s hitting me in the body I’m still clubbing him in the head. He’s hitting me in the body and hitting me with one big body shot then I’m hitting him two, three times in the face and I’m like ah not a big deal.
“But, then one hits right, and it hits me right on the ribs. This one makes you go ahhh, then those right hands that have been landing all day that where hitting me right on the chin with no big deal, and then my hands are here [shows his hands protecting his body] and I always say, if you take two shots to the same side of your face, that is the one that gets you,” he continued. “Stipe went body, boom, and then it went bop bop, and I was like wow. Then he charged.
“It was such a great adjustment and look at the stakes. This kid had everything to lose. He got knocked out in the first fight and he watched me and Brock Lesnar… We treated him like an afterthought. He waited a year, stood firm in his belief that he deserved a rematch. If he would have lost again, he’s done. All the pressure that was going on to what he had to do to win that fight. I think in terms of cage in fight, I landed 70 percent of my strikes, but credit where credit is due, I thought he did a fantastic job,” Daniel Cormier concluded.
The series is now tied 1-1 between the two and a trilogy is expected to happen in 2020.
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This article first appeared on BJPENN.com on 1/3/2020.