Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) heavyweight champion, Cain Velasquez, was stopped by Francis Ngannou in the UFC on ESPN 1 main event last night in Phoenix, Arizona, after just 26 seconds of action.
While the official ruling was “knockout” in favor of Ngannou, Velasquez insists he was not hurt by the Cameroonian “Predator” prior to a “freak” accident that caused his knee to buckle and put an end to the fight.
“It was just the knee, he didn’t even, like, touch me, you know?” Velasquez said during the post-fight press conference (watch it). “None of the punches grazed me at all or did anything to myself where I felt like I was unbalanced or anything. Just getting in on the inside and it was just a freak thing that happened with my knee.”
Watch the highlights and judge for yourself by clicking here.
Not surprisingly, Ngannou tells a much different tale, one that ends with his fist connecting with the ex-champ’s jaw. That might explain why Velasquez did the Pep Boys bobblehead prior to going into his impromptu split.
“You can look at the video, and you will see the uppercut,” Ngannou said. “That might be why the knee buckled, because he got disconnected. In the fight, you’re just trying to do whatever you can do to get out of there, because he was getting closer, and I didn’t want him to be close. I just wanted him to be at distance.”
Hey, shit happens (just ask this bantamweight).
Either way, Ngannou (13-3) moves on to bigger and better things within the division (just not this). Velasquez (14-3), meanwhile, goes back to the drawing board. What we can say for sure is that he’s now 36 and doesn’t have a lot of time to get himself back in the game.
Especially with this training regimen:
The day Cain’s career went downhill. pic.twitter.com/s35xNPeJMd
— Jonathan *Shemetov to Rizin* (@GlobeSvcs) February 18, 2019
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