UFC 241 Daniel Cormier vs Stipe Miocic
A blockbuster heavyweight championship rematch pits pound-for-pound king
Daniel Cormier against former champ Stipe Miocic, and Nate Diaz returns
to face Anthony “Showtime” Pettis at UFC 241 exclusively on ESPN+
A reprisal of their bout at UFC 226 in
mid-2018, Daniel Cormier vs. Stipe Miocic 2 is a bout that should’ve
coalesced immediately afterward, but took a year to come together; it
was only after Cormier finished an overmatched Derrick Lewis and Brock
Lesnar’s UFC return didn’t pan out that the UFC and Cormier circled back
to the most deserving man.
It’s a terrifically consequential bout, one that has about as much importance as any fight at 265 pounds; in a division that doesn’t have a whole lot of truly new challenges for him, Cormier is about the final frontier (perhaps excepting one Jon Jones) for the greatest UFC heavyweight champion of all time, where Cormier can be one of the few greats to avoid going out on their back if his career ends with a second win over the Clevelander while holding the heavyweight title belt.
A second win over Miocic doesn’t rectify that; after all, even now, the narrative involves Jon Jones as a potential opponent for the winner, and any successes that Cormier finds only add to the legend of his eternal foil. However, a win for Cormier introduces himself as an all-time great among 205 and 265 in a sense that Jones never was; while Jones was fine with clearing generations of light-heavyweight and defending against middleweights, Cormier went up to find harder challenges, and overcame one of the best fighters to exist above middleweight. If he can defeat that fighter again, his legacy would be even more secure than it is right now.
The foundation of Cormier’s success (even more so than his wrestling pedigree, which is fantastic) is absolutely freakish athleticism; somewhat overlooked due to his short frame and his contests against opponents who appear larger (such as Jones and Alexander Gustafsson) is Cormier’s absurd superiority in nearly every athletic facet over nearly every opponent he’s faced.
Cormier is one of the fastest heavyweights one can find (both of hand and of foot), he’s an extremely powerful wrestler, he’s capable of driving a hellish pace for five rounds that most heavyweights can’t take for two, and he’s proven nearly impossible to stop without a sustained attrition attack (even under the clean blows of notorious hitters such as Anthony “Rumble” Johnson); this gives him a margin of error as a technical striker that he uses to the fullest. Cormier’s process is simple: push his opponent to the fence, rough them up in the clinch, take them down, and wear them out until they break.
Before his loss at UFC 226, Stipe Miocic was the rarest of
heavyweight champions; while he wasn’t flashy, he was extraordinarily
skilled, and most importantly, he was consistent. The previous champions
hadn’t fit that bill (and the best that the best could do was two title
defenses), but Stipe Miocic’s title reign brought a sort of regularity
to the scene in every sense; he showed up every few months in a stark
contrast to champions like Cain Velasquez, and he didn’t have any
trouble in reaching the previous record for title defenses (smoking
Werdum and Overeem and dos Santos, all in under ten minutes total).
His performances grew more impressive even as his competition grew stiffer, and his bout against Francis Ngannou was a domination that only seems more impressive the more wins Ngannou racks up among the heavyweight elite. Miocic is the sort of champion that truly set a standard for the division in a way few champions have, and if he defeats Cormier in their rematch, it’s hard to find a man that can test him. First, he has to get past the only man to defeat him in over four years.
Miocic’s toolset isn’t all that broad, but among heavyweights, he’s one of the few strikers who has a game with real depth; while he mostly uses the same few tools when he’s allowed to, they perfectly set up his A-game, and are also versatile enough to let him change things up against different opponents.
It’s a terrifically consequential bout, one that has about as much importance as any fight at 265 pounds; in a division that doesn’t have a whole lot of truly new challenges for him, Cormier is about the final frontier (perhaps excepting one Jon Jones) for the greatest UFC heavyweight champion of all time, where Cormier can be one of the few greats to avoid going out on their back if his career ends with a second win over the Clevelander while holding the heavyweight title belt.
Daniel Cormier
It’s somewhat unfair to say that Daniel Cormier’s career has been defined as much by his failures as by his successes, but it’s a situation at least somewhat of his own making; while Cormier has effectively cleaned out the light-heavyweight division and even knocked out the greatest heavyweight to enter a UFC cage, and while he hasn’t failed nearly as many times as he’s found success, he himself has made the story of his career inextricably tied to that of the man who dominated him twice.
A second win over Miocic doesn’t rectify that; after all, even now, the narrative involves Jon Jones as a potential opponent for the winner, and any successes that Cormier finds only add to the legend of his eternal foil. However, a win for Cormier introduces himself as an all-time great among 205 and 265 in a sense that Jones never was; while Jones was fine with clearing generations of light-heavyweight and defending against middleweights, Cormier went up to find harder challenges, and overcame one of the best fighters to exist above middleweight. If he can defeat that fighter again, his legacy would be even more secure than it is right now.
The foundation of Cormier’s success (even more so than his wrestling pedigree, which is fantastic) is absolutely freakish athleticism; somewhat overlooked due to his short frame and his contests against opponents who appear larger (such as Jones and Alexander Gustafsson) is Cormier’s absurd superiority in nearly every athletic facet over nearly every opponent he’s faced.
Cormier is one of the fastest heavyweights one can find (both of hand and of foot), he’s an extremely powerful wrestler, he’s capable of driving a hellish pace for five rounds that most heavyweights can’t take for two, and he’s proven nearly impossible to stop without a sustained attrition attack (even under the clean blows of notorious hitters such as Anthony “Rumble” Johnson); this gives him a margin of error as a technical striker that he uses to the fullest. Cormier’s process is simple: push his opponent to the fence, rough them up in the clinch, take them down, and wear them out until they break.
Stipe Miocic
His performances grew more impressive even as his competition grew stiffer, and his bout against Francis Ngannou was a domination that only seems more impressive the more wins Ngannou racks up among the heavyweight elite. Miocic is the sort of champion that truly set a standard for the division in a way few champions have, and if he defeats Cormier in their rematch, it’s hard to find a man that can test him. First, he has to get past the only man to defeat him in over four years.
Miocic’s toolset isn’t all that broad, but among heavyweights, he’s one of the few strikers who has a game with real depth; while he mostly uses the same few tools when he’s allowed to, they perfectly set up his A-game, and are also versatile enough to let him change things up against different opponents.
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