Cody Garbrandt felt his recent loss had more to do with himself rather than losing to the opponent.
On Saturday night, Garbrandt fell short on a unanimous decision loss to fellow bantamweight contender Rob Font who put on a dominant performance at UFC Vegas 27. Garbrandt is now 1-4 in his last five fights since winning the UFC title back in December 2016. Font was able to outstrike Garbrandt mostly with his left jab for the majority of the bout forcing “No Love” to panic wrestle a couple of times with little success.
After suffering defeat, Garbrandt immediately went to his Instagram live stream to release a heartfelt statement where he described that his internal battles perhaps got the better of him whilst giving his props to Font.
“Rob was the better man,” Garbrandt said. “I felt like I was fighting myself in there, battling myself. I’m not taking anything away from him. Congrats to his camp, congrats to him.”
Garbrandt failed to clarify the extent of his personal internal battle. Garbrandt has been on a bit of a rollercoaster ride the last 9 months after his win over Rafael Assuncao where he knocked out the Brazilian with a highlight reel KO at UFC 250. Since then, Garbrandt was forced to withdraw from his flyweight title fight against Deiveson Figueiredo in November when he suffered from a bad case of COVID-19. It is hard to say but perhaps the time off and actually making it to the fight, had its effect on Garbrandt.
Garbrandt expressed he has no intentions of giving up on becoming a world champion despite suffering quite a dominant loss to Font but instead looks to focus on the positives he can gain from the fight.
“A lot of positive come from this,” Garbrandt said. “Brush it off. Get back with my coaches and teammates and we’re still striving to be the best, to be world champion. Sometimes there’s adversity that comes along in your dreams and makes you work harder and makes you realize what needs to be done and it makes it that much sweeter when you climb up the mountain.
“It wasn’t my night, but man I enjoy this. I’ll correct my mistakes and just really thankful. … I fight my heart out for you guys.”
Do you think Cody Garbrandt will climb back to the mountain that is the UFC bantamweight crown again?
