At UFC 239, Ben Askren suffered his first professional loss. There, Jorge Masvidal ran across the cage and landed a perfectly timed flying knee that knocked “Funky” out cold. The official time was five seconds, but it was much sooner than that.
Following the loss, Ben Askren went on ESPN and handled the loss very well.
“I always thought, ‘who the hell gets flying kneed? Can’t you see that coming? It’s coming from so far away!’ When I watched the film — I don’t like Jorge at all — but that was a damn good flying knee,” Askren said on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show. “He hit it fast and explosively, he got some serious air time on it, and then obviously connected in the right spot.”
How he handled it caught the attention of Chael Sonnen who admits Askren handled his loss how every fighter should.
“I believe it’s because people are seeing the real Ben Askren, which is a guy who likes to go out and entertain,” Sonnen said on his podcast (as transcribed by BJPENN.com). “He likes to antagonize because he understands the business and he understands to get his spot and make sure he has attention, he needs to do a little of that. A guy who makes weight, walks out there, does the heavy lifting, takes on anybody that’s asked of him under any ruleset in any continent in any organization you want to do it in. And then tips his hat at the end of the night likes a sportsman would. No excuses, tip your hat, grab your stuff, shower up and move on.”
How do you think Ben Askren handled his loss?
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