CINCINNATI — Daniel Cormier may have entered the Strikeforce World Heavyweight Grand Prix as an alternate, but after a dominant performance in a knockout victory over Antonio Silva, no one can question whether he deserves a place in the finals.
However, after Cormier showed up at the post-fight press conference early Sunday morning with the right hand he used to dispatch “Bigfoot” Silva wrapped up in a tight wad of bandages, some may question when he’ll be fit enough to fight again, and whether it will be soon enough for the powers that be.
“I kind of hurt my hand on the very first right hand,” Cormier said. “When he went down, he got up and I was like, man, how am I going to get through the next fifteen minutes of this with my hand hurting like it was. I just kept throwing it.”
It didn’t take long before Cormier connected again, putting Silva down with a short right uppercut near the end of the round and then finishing him off with dueling hammer fists. With the win, the former U.S. Olympic wrestling team captain secured a spot opposite Josh Barnett in the Grand Prix finals, though whether he’ll truly get that chance could be contingent upon his injury and availability, said Strikeforce’s Scott Coker.
“If Daniel wasn’t available for an extended period of time we would consider another fight [for the Grand Prix final],” Coker said, explaining that the goal was to complete the tournament some time in the first quarter of 2012.
That would make for a bittersweet ending to Cormier’s improbable run in the tournament. After being named as an alternate in the tournament, he defeated Jeff Monson via decision in June, then got the call to join the Grand Prix after heavyweight champ Alistair Overeem was pulled from the tournament and dropped from Strikeforce.
He came into the fight with Silva as a slight underdog, but the undefeated Cormier demolished the much bigger Brazilian thanks to his powerful right hand. If the right hand is broken — and, judging from Cormier’s post-fight remarks, it may very well be — it could be months before he’s able to fight again.
If that’s the case, it could put Strikeforce and its parent company, Zuffa, in a tough spot. Both want to wrap up the Grand Prix before it stretches on too long, but after Saturday night it’s clear that Cormier vs. Barnett will be the only legitimate final.
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For Cormier, however, an injury withdrawal at this stage is a worst-case scenario that he hasn’t even begun to consider too heavily. Getting a win over Silva, who defeated Fedor Emelianenko in the quarterfinal of the tournament, is a huge accomplishment at this stage of his MMA career, and he admitted that it hadn’t “completely sunk in yet.”
Still, on a night when all three of his AKA teammates on the card recorded victories, Cormier had the confidence and the backing of his coach and manager Bob Cook to carry with him into the cage. And that, he said, made all the difference.
“Bob Cook is my guy. Right before my fight he came up to me and said, ‘Look man, he has nothing for you. You’re a winner. That’s what you do, and I have all the faith in the world that you’re going to win tonight.’ That statement was enough. I was in the back kind of putting some pressure on myself, with all the [AKA] guys winning. But then I was like, you know what, I’ve won before. I just need to do what I know and what I’ve trained to do and the result will take care of itself.”
Now he just has to hope that his injuries aren’t too serious and that Strikeforce isn’t too impatient for a Grand Prix final. Either one could mean disappointment for Cormier, and neither is within his control at this point.
CINCINNATI — Daniel Cormier may have entered the Strikeforce World Heavyweight Grand Prix as an alternate, but after a dominant performance in a knockout victory over Antonio Silva, no one can question whether he deserves a place in the finals.
However, after Cormier showed up at the post-fight press conference early Sunday morning with the right hand he used to dispatch “Bigfoot” Silva wrapped up in a tight wad of bandages, some may question when he’ll be fit enough to fight again, and whether it will be soon enough for the powers that be.
“I kind of hurt my hand on the very first right hand,” Cormier said. “When he went down, he got up and I was like, man, how am I going to get through the next fifteen minutes of this with my hand hurting like it was. I just kept throwing it.”
It didn’t take long before Cormier connected again, putting Silva down with a short right uppercut near the end of the round and then finishing him off with dueling hammer fists. With the win, the former U.S. Olympic wrestling team captain secured a spot opposite Josh Barnett in the Grand Prix finals, though whether he’ll truly get that chance could be contingent upon his injury and availability, said Strikeforce’s Scott Coker.
“If Daniel wasn’t available for an extended period of time we would consider another fight [for the Grand Prix final],” Coker said, explaining that the goal was to complete the tournament some time in the first quarter of 2012.
That would make for a bittersweet ending to Cormier’s improbable run in the tournament. After being named as an alternate in the tournament, he defeated Jeff Monson via decision in June, then got the call to join the Grand Prix after heavyweight champ Alistair Overeem was pulled from the tournament and dropped from Strikeforce.
He came into the fight with Silva as a slight underdog, but the undefeated Cormier demolished the much bigger Brazilian thanks to his powerful right hand. If the right hand is broken — and, judging from Cormier’s post-fight remarks, it may very well be — it could be months before he’s able to fight again.
If that’s the case, it could put Strikeforce and its parent company, Zuffa, in a tough spot. Both want to wrap up the Grand Prix before it stretches on too long, but after Saturday night it’s clear that Cormier vs. Barnett will be the only legitimate final.
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For Cormier, however, an injury withdrawal at this stage is a worst-case scenario that he hasn’t even begun to consider too heavily. Getting a win over Silva, who defeated Fedor Emelianenko in the quarterfinal of the tournament, is a huge accomplishment at this stage of his MMA career, and he admitted that it hadn’t “completely sunk in yet.”
Still, on a night when all three of his AKA teammates on the card recorded victories, Cormier had the confidence and the backing of his coach and manager Bob Cook to carry with him into the cage. And that, he said, made all the difference.
“Bob Cook is my guy. Right before my fight he came up to me and said, ‘Look man, he has nothing for you. You’re a winner. That’s what you do, and I have all the faith in the world that you’re going to win tonight.’ That statement was enough. I was in the back kind of putting some pressure on myself, with all the [AKA] guys winning. But then I was like, you know what, I’ve won before. I just need to do what I know and what I’ve trained to do and the result will take care of itself.”
Now he just has to hope that his injuries aren’t too serious and that Strikeforce isn’t too impatient for a Grand Prix final. Either one could mean disappointment for Cormier, and neither is within his control at this point.
CINCINNATI — Daniel Cormier may have entered the Strikeforce World Heavyweight Grand Prix as an alternate, but after a dominant performance in a knockout victory over Antonio Silva, no one can question whether he deserves a place in the finals.