Legitimate champ or not, Daniel Cormier showed true grit in UFC 192 win
Daniel Cormier defended a championship on Saturday that a large percentage of fight fans don’t view as legitimate.
He retained the light heavyweight belt he won in May by defeating Alexander Gustafsson on Saturday via split decision in the main event of UFC 192, coming out on top in one of the year’s best fights.
It was a back-and-forth, bruising, bloody battle, reminiscent of ex-champion Jon Jones’ epic victory over Gustafsson at UFC 165 in Toronto. Like Jones did at UFC 165, Cormier took the final round to pull out the win at the Toyota Center in Houston.
Kerry Hatley scored it 49-46 for Cormier, giving him all but the second round. Sal D’Amato scored it 48-47 for Cormier, while Derek Cleary scored it 48-47 for Gustafsson. Cleary gave Gustafsson Rounds 2, 3 and 4. Yahoo Sports had it for Cormier, 48-47, giving him Rounds 1, 3 and 5 in an insanely close and competitive fight.
After four rounds, D’Amato had it even 38-38. Hatley had Cormier up 39-37 and Cleary had Gustafsson up 39-37. When Cormier won the fifth – and all three judges gave Cormier gave him the fifth – he pulled out the fight on D’Amato’s card and earned the win.
Anyone who wonders why professional athletes deserve every last penny they earn need only have seen what Cormier and Gustafsson were willing to endure in order to hoist the belt skyward at the end of the night.
They each gave everything they had to give, and sacrificed greatly in a grueling battle Cormier took by the narrowest of margins. Each man took tremendous abuse and kept coming, earning their money and then some with a memorable performance.
It probably wasn’t enough to make fans regard Cormier as the legitimate champion, but it showed him to be one of the toughest, most hard-nosed men in the world.
Gustafsson’s six-inch height and seven-inch reach advantage played a major factor in the fight, just as it did in his razor-thin defeat to Jones.
The 6-foot-5 Swede, who was pummeled around the cage for most of the third round, nearly ended it in that round with a huge knee to the chops in the waning seconds that badly hurt Cormier and nearly finished him.
But Cormier came out on the attack in Round 4, indicative of the grit he showed throughout the battle.
“Thank you, Alexander Gustafsson,” Cormier said in the cage after the bout. “I will forever be indebted to you and your performance tonight. Thank you. Thank you.”
Later, Cormier said, “I left a part of myself in this Octagon tonight.”
That he did, as did his opponent. And one has to wonder how many more of these type of fights Gustafsson can take. The fight with Jones in 2013 was one of the greatest in UFC history, an epic back-and-forth battle.
Gustafsson suffered a great deal of punishment in that fight. He rebounded nicely, but in January was knocked out by Anthony “Rumble” Johnson and then went through another grueling five-round battle Saturday.
The effects became obvious over the final six-and-a-half minutes, as Cormier had more left in the tank. Gustafsson’s strategy was to circle in a bid to not only make it hard for Cormier, a two-time Olympic wrestler, to get him to the ground, but also to set up his strikes.
But Cormier’s constant pressure, and his uppercuts from the clinch, made a mess of the Swede’s face and took much of his steam out. He was badly fatigued in the fifth, when Cormier was clearly there to be taken. But Cormier simply had more reserve in that round and it won him the fight.
Gustafsson, who bear-hugged and then lifted Cormier off the ground after the verdict was announced, paid tribute to Cormier’s striking.
“D.C. is a beast,” an exhausted Gustafsson said. “He proved he can strike. He’s a good boxer, a good stand-up guy. He’s the real champ.”
That is the big question: Is he the real champion? Jones routed Cormier in January, and he would be considered as such should they fight again, but Jones was stripped of the belt in April after he left the scene of a traffic accident in Albuquerque, N.M.
But Jones reached a plea deal on Tuesday and should be reinstated soon by the UFC.
Jones was so dominant in his January win over Cormier that it’s hard to regard Cormier as the real champion until he defeats Jones in the cage.
And that opportunity may come soon.
But Cormier will need a long vacation to recover from this one. He proved his mettle in a gut-check fight, earning the respect of anyone who saw him eat a series of shots as he kept plugging forward.
That earned him another title fight, hopefully against Jones if the UFC lifts its suspension of him and if Jones chooses to fight again. That’s no guarantee.
If Jones does get into the cage to compete again, the one thing he’ll know for sure is that no matter what, Cormier will keep coming.
As the popular former Olympian proved Saturday, he’ll do just about anything in pursuit of a win.