Photo by Rey Del Rio/Getty Images
Coach Eric Albarracin refutes manager Ali Abdelaziz’s claims about Henry Cejudo carrying on with his fighting career.
After a successful defense of his bantamweight title at UFC 249, Henry Cejudo declared retirement at 33 years of age. Manager Ali Abdelaziz, however, believes “Triple C” isn’t done with the sport just yet.
“Henry’s got everybody on their knees right now,” Abdelaziz told TMZ. “I don’t think he’s gonna retire. You’re gonna see him fight by this summer. This is what I think.”
Coach Eric Albarracin says he was also caught off guard when Cejudo made the announcement. But unlike Abdelaziz, he believes this decision is final.
“We were really surprised,” Albarracin told BJPenn.com. “On the day of the fight, we were talking about who he was going to call out after the fight. We talked about Conor McGregor, Alexander Volkanovski, and Aldo, and we thought let’s call them all out. The plan was to change Henry’s nickname to ‘C4’ and Henry said stop right there I’m done. If he’s happy, I’m happy.
“I would never say never but it is permanent,” he clarified. “When Henry won the Olympics in 2008, everyone thought he would go two or three more and he said ‘I’m done’ the next day. We’ve seen this before.
“He came back in 2012 but his heart wasn’t in it. He knows you can’t take two or three years off from this game and come back at the top. Cruz did it, but it’s really hard so I think he is done.”
Cejudo made the announcement right after his second-round TKO win over Dominick Cruz. He holds a professional record of 16-2 and holds notable wins against two other former champions in Demetrious Johnson and TJ Dillashaw.