After a 15 second No Contest in Mexico City, Jeremy Stephens is bandaged up, mad, and ready to fight Yair Rodriguez again.
UFC Fight Night 159 from Mexico City went completely sideways during the main event, with the much anticipated Yair Rodriguez vs. Jeremy Stephens scrap ending over an eyepoke just 15 seconds into the fight. You can watch Yair swat Jeremy’s eye right here, or check out the classy Mexico crowd pelting Stephens with beer and popcorn as he exits the cage.
We’ve seen some questionable stoppages due to eye pokes (Ryan Bader vs. Cheick Kongo and Todd Duffee vs. Jeff Hughes come to mind), but Jeremy Stephens seems legit messed up. “Lil Heathen” is about the last person who’d ditch out of a fight, and if you doubted the severity of the poke take a look at his condition in this video Stephens made from the hospital.
Tonight’s No Contest in the #UFCMexico main event left @panteraufc questioning the severity of the eye injury. Here’s @LiLHeathenMMA‘s response from the hospital moments ago: pic.twitter.com/tLMNvnQgFL
— Karyn Bryant (@KarynBryant) September 22, 2019
”Yair, you think I’m faking, bro??” Stephens said. “You’re the one that poked me in the eye. Let’s run it back in four or five weeks, two weeks, whatever. I’ll be ready. It’s just a deep scratch, deep bruise. You’re the one that poked me. Let’s run it back motherf**ker. Let’s go.”
Two weeks? That seems unlikely. But could the UFC reschedule this barnburner for UFC 245 on December 14th? That’s enough time for Stephens to properly heal his eye and get back into a groove in training before the fight. While it’s terrible that Mexico City got served up a dud of a main event, you gotta make lemonade out of these lemons.