Order In The Court! Moicano Ditched Law School For UFC

UFC Vegas 30’s Renato Moicano was on his way to becoming a lawyer before giving in to his MMA dreams.

UFC fighter Renato Moicano could have been a lawyer, but that would have been the worst thing for him.

Moicano (14-4-1) fights Jai Herbert (10-2) at UFC Vegas 30: Ciryl Gane vs. Alexander Volkov, which takes place at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, NV on Sat., June 26 via ESPN+. Living the dream, Moicano told MMAMania.com how a pivotal moment in life led him to the UFC.

“I had a really good life. My parents had good jobs. I didn’t have a really tough childhood like a lot of other fighters in Brazil. I always loved to compete and loved to fight. I started in judo when I was eight. Since then, I fell in love with combat sports,” Moicano explained. “When I saw the opportunity to be an MMA fighter and live and train every day as I do, I just grabbed the opportunity. In the beginning, my parents didn’t allow me to do it. My father used to say, ‘This is not worth it. You’re going to have a brain injury. I want you to be a doctor or lawyer.’ I actually did two years in law school in Brazil. I was going to college every day, studying and learning, but I also training to become an MMA fighter. I got to a point where I had to choose and I put everything aside just to pursue this dream to become an MMA fighter. This was the best thing that I did in my life. Otherwise, right now I would be living a really bad life. If you don’t do what you want, life is miserable.

“I know every profession has good and bad sides, but you don’t have to think about the good and bad sides. You have to think about what you really want to do. You just have one chance to have a good life. You don’t have two chances,” he exclaimed. “I grabbed mine and I feel blessed to fight in the UFC and to be able to live in America with my family. This is a great thing for me. To be an athlete, especially a UFC fighter, is a dream come true for me. I hope I do even more things in this sport. I really feel I am a really good fighter. I feel I am one of the best in the world and I want to prove that to everybody. That next step is June 26 against Jai Herbert… I’m going to put everything on the line.”

Moicano, who is coming off a first-round knockout loss to Rafael Fiziev at UFC 256, briefly touched on the adjustments he made heading into the Herbert fight.

“I feel like last fight, I was too comfortable in the Octagon so I got caught,” he said. “I don’t want to take anything from my opponent but maybe I got too comfortable. I just have to be more aware of what I have to do. I think I worked a lot on this.”

UFC Vegas 30 takes place at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada on Sat., June 26. The ESPN+ card is headlined by Ciryl Gane vs. Alexander Volkov in a ranked heavyweight match-up.

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