It’s safe to say that Luke Rockhold’s UFC career so far has been somewhat underwhelming till now. Rockhold did become the UFC champion, though lost the belt in his first title defense. It still isn’t an underwhelming feat, though compared to his former Strikeforce run and the huge onus of expectations that he had on his shoulders while entering the UFC, his octagon career does look a bit pale. After a heartbreaking and brutal knock-out loss at UFC 221, Rockhold had revealed his plans on moving to light heavyweight and he was expected to fight top contender Alexander Gustafsson soon. However, the former American Kickboxing Academy man has now injured his knee again, this will also delay a potential fight against the Swede.
Rockhold had won the Strikeforce middleweight title against, “The Alligator” Ronaldo Souza. He later successfully defended the belt twice, once against Keith Jardine and later against Tim Kennedy. He later won the UFC middleweight title against Chris Weidman at UFC 194 but lost the belt in his next fight to Michael Bisping. He was recently knocked out by Yoel Romero in a match for the interim title at UFC 221.
Rockhold’s fading chin has been called into question, as he has lost all four of his fights via KO or TKO. He truly showed signs of a rapidly fading chin against Bisping as he was knocked out by “The Count”, who is rather infamous for having really less power in his punches. Thus, there are some concerns surrounding Rockhold’s chin withstanding punches from powerful light heavyweights.
There has been plenty of back and forth banter going on between Rockhold and “The Mauler”. Their fight was being targeted for UFC 227 in Los Angeles for August 4 but was yet to be officially confirmed.
The news about Rockhold’s knee injury was recently broken by MMA FIghting’s noted combat sports journalist, Ariel Helwani via his Twitter handle. Here’s what he tweeted:
Luke Rockhold reinjured his leg in training late last week and is now definitely not fighting Alexander Gustafsson this summer. I’m told he’s hoping to return in October, at the earliest. Here’s a video he provided to me of his shin getting stitched up. (Warning: GRAPHIC) pic.twitter.com/CDQseH7nUN
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) May 22, 2018
And if that video wasn’t enough for you, here’s another of the stitching. pic.twitter.com/7DNsftcirW
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) May 22, 2018
ALSO READ:
UFC: Luke Rockhold and Michael Bisping take digs at each other
Boxing: Liam Smith will challenge Jaime Munguia for the WBO super-welterweight title
MMA: Drew Chatman apologises for flipping off knocked-out Irvin Ayala’s back
SHARE
