{"id":381958,"date":"2021-04-12T17:27:30","date_gmt":"2021-04-13T00:27:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=381958"},"modified":"2021-04-12T17:27:30","modified_gmt":"2021-04-13T00:27:30","slug":"tony-ferguson-explains-how-his-two-recent-losses-were-the-best-thing-that-was-for-me-and-my-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/tony-ferguson-explains-how-his-two-recent-losses-were-the-best-thing-that-was-for-me-and-my-family\/","title":{"rendered":"Tony Ferguson explains how his two recent losses were \u201cthe best thing that was for me and my family\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tony Ferguson went nearly a decade without losing and then in 2020, “El Cucuy” went 0-2, but he believes those losses were the best thing to ever happen to him.<\/p>\n

Ferguson first fought Justin Gaethje for the interim lightweight title in May, which served as the first event back for the UFC from the pandemic. Unfortunately, Ferguson suffered a fifth-round TKO loss<\/a>. El Cucuy then took a short notice fight against Charles Oliveira at UFC 256 and lost a clear-cut decision in a fight he was dominated in.<\/p>\n

Now, ahead of his fight with Beneil Dariush at UFC 262<\/a>, Ferguson says losing two fights in a row where the best thing that happened to him.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast year, it had nothing to do with coaches or anything else,\u201d Ferguson told\u00a0Submission Radio<\/a>\u00a0(h\/t MMAJunkie<\/a>). \u201cSeriously, I take all the fall and all my blame on it, but the two losses that I had, I\u2019m gonna be real with you guys: It was the best learning experience I probably could\u2019ve ever had and the best thing that was for me and my family.<\/p>\n

“Chasing after a guy like (retired former champion) Khabib and then trying to get the fight and then not getting the fight and then having interim belts dangled in front of you, the game is what it is,” Ferguson continued. “You can\u2019t get mad at the game. But how you play the game is exactly your approach. And that\u2019s what I did for this year. I completely changed my approach.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the back-to-back setbacks, Ferguson changed up his training and his mindset. Now, he says he has the fire back in him like he did when he was competing on The Ultimate Fighter. Ferguson also knows this fight against Dariush is the perfect to get back to his funky style of mixing in wrestling and striking, instead of being too one-dimensional.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere we\u2019re at right now, I\u2019m hungry as f*ck,\u201d Ferguson said. \u201cAnd I haven\u2019t had the love for the game in a minute. I\u2019m gonna be real: I haven\u2019t even sparred yet, but I\u2019m getting that f*cking hunger just being around it over at Wild Card.<\/p>\n

“Instead of a varsity mentality, I went back to an Olympic mentality,” Ferguson concluded. “I started to surround myself around people that are hungry how I am and how they\u2019ve been for a long time. And I started to find myself over at Wild Card a lot easier, because that\u2019s where I knew that I could find that kind of grind.\u201d<\/p>\n

How do you think Tony Ferguson will do against Beneil Dariush?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tony Ferguson went nearly a decade without losing and then in 2020, “El Cucuy” went 0-2, but he believes those losses were the best thing to ever happen to him. Ferguson first fought Justin Gaethje for the interim lightweight title in May, which served as the first event back for the UFC from the pandemic. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54463,"featured_media":381959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10113,39610],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nTony Ferguson explains how his two recent losses were \u201cthe best thing that was for me and my family\u201d | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tony Ferguson went nearly a decade without losing and then in 2020, "El Cucuy" went 0-2, but he believes those losses were the best thing.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/tony-ferguson-explains-how-his-two-recent-losses-were-the-best-thing-that-was-for-me-and-my-family\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta 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