The UFC’s latest rankings have Daniel Cormier as the No. 2 heavyweight, while Roy Nelson, following his UFC 159 knockout victory over Cheick Kongo, comes in at No. 5. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that this fight, at least on paper, makes sense for both fighters. However, it appears that Nelson’s manager, Mike Kogan, has no interest in his client looking at that paper.
Cormier, following UFC 159, brought up the prospect of facing Nelson when he tweeted:
Speaking on Tuesday’s episode of UFC Tonight, Fuel TV’s Ariel Helwani said that Kogan was going to advise his client not to take the fight against Cormier if it was offered because Kogan feels it makes no sense for Nelson.
Helwani reported that Kogan was going to request a fight with Antonio Silva if Silva loses to UFC champion Cain Velasquez at UFC 160. If that fight is not in the cards for Nelson, Helwani said Kogan would look to book Nelson to face either the winner or loser of UFC 160’s co-main event between Junior dos Santos and Mark Hunt.
The logic here is kind of puzzling. A manager wanting to book a fight for his client against a fighter coming off a loss and with a lower standing in the rankings than Cormier seems counterintuitive. Silva may be fighting Velasquez for the title, but he was knocked out by Cormier and is ranked lower than Cormier.
As for getting a shot at the winner of Dos Santos and Hunt, that’s at best a 50-50 proposition for Nelson. The odds of the winner of that fight moving on to fight for the UFC title are pretty high.
In a bit of an interesting turn, Nelson doesn’t seem to agree with his manager, as the fighter tweeted the following after the UFC Tonight report aired:
So, it looks like the door isn’t closed on a Nelson versus Cormier fight. This is a good thing, as the fight does make sense for both Nelson and Cormier.
Now all we need is for Nelson and his manager to get on the same page.
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