UFC 252: Daniel Cormier wants to punch Stipe Miocic in the face, not just wrestle him
- ‘It’s fun, I enjoy it. His head just kinda stays there,’ says Cormier, who knows Miocic will go back to the body shots despite the champ’s claims
- ‘He’s not being coy. You can tell, he always smirks when he tries to say he’s not gonna do it,’ quips the former champ
Daniel Cormier admits the simplest path to reclaiming the heavyweight belt at UFC 252 this weekend, and going out on a high in MMA, is is by using his wrestling against Stipe Miocic.
Indeed, it was a method that was working well in the second fight of this title trilogy, at UFC 241 a year ago. But the former Olympic amateur wrestler unwisely got caught in a stand-up war, and then caught out with a body shot, en route to a fourth-round TKO defeat that returned the title to Miocic’s possession.
Still, the 41-year-old former two-division champ “DC” (22-2, one no contest) doesn’t plan on doing things the easy way this weekend against his fellow American Miocic (19-3).
“The easiest path for me is to try to take him down and hold him down,” he said at Thursday night’s pre-fight press conference at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. “But I don’t wanna just take him down. I wanna fight him. I like punching him in the face, it’s fun. I enjoy it. His head kinda just stays there. So I’m gonna punch him, wrestle him. I’m gonna do everything.”
“Everybody talks about, ‘Oh, you’re an Olympic level wrestler, just go and take this dude down’. Dude knows how to wrestle. I felt it immediately when I grabbed his leg. I understand that he has the skills to defend takedowns. He took me down.
“So it’s not as simple as I just go take him down. But I do believe if I get to his legs and I can extend the wrestling sequences then I’ll come out on top, because I feel like I can do that against anybody. Because I wanna fight him. I don’t just wanna wrestle him, I wanna fight him too.”
