It’s hard to imagine, but not that long ago Daniel Cormier was looked at as little more than a former wrestler who got involved in mixed martial arts a little later than he should have.
He fought for XMMA and King of the Cage in 2009, eventually moving on to Strikeforce where he fought on the Challengers series and one Strikeforce preliminary card before getting a fight against Jeff Monson as an alternate in the Strikeforce World Heavyweight Grand Prix.
Cormier, 7-0 at the time of the Monson fight, took a unanimous decision over the veteran fighter and that win catapulted him into the Grand Prix when Alistair Overeem was released from the promotion and a spot opened up in the tournament.
Cormier seized the moment, earning a knockout victory over Antonio Silva. That win put him in the Grand Prix final where he met former UFC heavyweight champion Josh Barnett, defeating Barnett via unanimous decision.
After the Silva and Barnett wins, fans and pundits started to view Cormier as a legitimate threat to anyone the UFC could offer him. The problem was that he had to fight once more for Strikeforce before he could make that leap.
That final fight came against Dion Staring, and shortly after his TKO win over Staring, Cormier made the jump to the UFC. Cormier’s first fight with the promotion will be on April 20 against another former UFC heavyweight champion, Frank Mir.
That fight will be contested at heavyweight. If Cormier gets past Mir, that presents a problem as Cormier and current UFC heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez are training partners at American Kickboxing Academy.
UFC president Dana White was asked about Cormier’s future at the UFC on Fuel 7 post-fight media scrum, which was attended by Bleacher Report.
While White admitted that he hadn’t talked to Cormier about what his future holds past the bout with Mir, he fully expected Cormier to make the drop to the light heavyweight division, saying “I just think that’s where he’s going to end up. That was the relationship he had with Cain (Velasquez), he’s Cain’s wrestling coach. I just think that’s what they’re (AKA) going to do. I think they’ll have him go to 205. Who knows, maybe they will fight. Maybe they’ll say, we can fight. I don’t think so, just saying, maybe.”
As far as what he think of Cormier at light heavyweight, White offered, “I think he’s awesome, at 205 I think he’s a beast.”
If the move to 205 does come for Cormier it will not be a shock, as he has made it clear that he is gunning for Jon Jones’ title in that division.
**All quotes obtained first-hand by B/R MMA.
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