{"id":340083,"date":"2020-02-04T07:20:24","date_gmt":"2020-02-04T15:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=340083"},"modified":"2020-02-04T07:20:24","modified_gmt":"2020-02-04T15:20:24","slug":"ben-rothwell-ponders-what-if-he-and-stipe-miocic-had-fought-in-dublin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/ben-rothwell-ponders-what-if-he-and-stipe-miocic-had-fought-in-dublin\/","title":{"rendered":"Ben Rothwell ponders &#8216;what if&#8217; he and Stipe Miocic had fought in Dublin"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n<p>UFC heavyweight Ben Rothwell has questioned what might&#8217;ve happened if he had wound up fighting Stipe Miocic in Dublin a few years ago as originally planned.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>Rothwell, who is coming off the back on a TKO win over Stefan Struve at the end of last year, is set to square off against Gian Villante at UFC 249 as he attempts to work his way back into the title picture in the heavyweight division.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>During a recent interview with <a href=\"https:\/\/mmajunkie.usatoday.com\/2020\/02\/ben-rothwell-wonders-what-if-stipe-miocic-fight-happened-ufc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"MMA Junkie (opens in a new tab)\">MMA Junkie<\/a>, Rothwell noted that he may have had a pretty good opportunity to vault himself into contention just over four years ago.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>\u201cStipe and I were supposed to fight October of 2015,\u201d Rothwell said. \u201cAnd some weird act of God took place and he was taken from me and matched against Andrei Arlovski two months later and started a title run. So yeah \u2013 that kind of reminds me, \u2018What if?&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s never going to leave me that I\u2019m a horrible matchup for Stipe in so many ways, and he goes around and he\u2019s the \u2018baddest man on the planet,&#8217;\u201d Rothwell continued. \u201cWell, I\u2019m just a guy who\u2019ll beat him.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve gotten to a point in my career where I have to believe in myself \u2013 I just do,\u201d Rothwell added. \u201cI believe in my skills. I always believe that you have to show the best that I can, and I\u2019ve just gotta get in there. And once I get in the cage, as long as I can be healthy, I believe it\u2019s going to be a good time.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m done chasing things that are out of my control. It\u2019s just about each fight: Go out, perform my best and be exciting. That\u2019s all that really matters.\u201d<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>At the time Ben Rothwell was riding a three-fight win streak, whereas Miocic went on to beat Andrei Arlovski which set up his title fight against Fabricio Werdum.<\/p>\r\n<p class=\"p1\"><i>This article first appeared on\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>BJPENN.com<\/i><\/span><\/a><i>\u00a0on 2\/4\/2020.<\/i><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UFC heavyweight Ben Rothwell has questioned what might&#8217;ve happened if he had wound up fighting Stipe Miocic in Dublin a few years ago as originally planned.\u00a0 Rothwell, who is coming off the back on a TKO win over Stefan Struve at the end of last year, is set to square off against Gian Villante at [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54478,"featured_media":334546,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10102,10253,39610],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Ben Rothwell ponders &#039;what if&#039; 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