When he beat Donald Cerrone at UFC Vegas 26, Alex Morono was stepping up on short notice to replace Diego Sanchez. Following the fight, he let out all of his thoughts on Diego’s UFC release and his coach, Joshua Fabia.
Morono stepped up on just a few days notice to replace Sanchez in a welterweight bout against Cowboy. This came after the TUF 1 winner was shockingly released by the UFC, as a result of issues related to his eccentric coach, Joshua Fabia.
Since Diego’s release, fans and fighters alike have been expressing their displeasure with the way Fabia negatively effected the end of Diego’s UFC tenure. Whether it is concerns from Dana White, or others feeling like that Fabia is controlling Diego, nobody is thrilled with the situation.
Alex Morono Does Not Hold Back
In the end, Alex Morono would score the first round TKO over Donald Cerrone, scoring the biggest win of his career. However it seems that he feels rather bad about the whole situation that led to this fight.
Speaking with media at the post-fight press conference, Alex did not hold back when asked about his thoughts on the situation with Diego and the UFC. While he was not particularly aggressive about it, he did say that he would have rather left Diego to fight Cerrone, and that he wants Diego to have a better coach.
“I can speak pretty freely, yeah?” Morono said (h/t MMAMania). “So I’ve asked for the Diego fight for a while, but I’m not trying to fight these old vets. I just like that Diego runs to the front and throws down. I just thought that’d be cool…
“I’ve built such a resume for myself as a martial artist for two reasons: one, for my own personal goal accomplishing reasons, and two: so my students know that their coach has gone through the fire. For as long as there’s been society, people have been fighting. Martial arts have been around forever. And so long as martial arts has been around, there have been these fake coaches. Just who, they believe their stuff is real, and I can’t believe how embedded this one is in Diego.
“I’m sure you’ve seen the video of [Diego] hanging upside down getting punched and kicked in the head. That is insane. It’s crazy to see,” Morono continued.
“I’d really wanted to see Diego and [Donald] fight. If someone had given me the option of going back and time and force it so Diego and Cowboy fight, I’d say yes and not step in, knowing this outcome. That’s how much I think Cowboy has earned it. Diego too, talk about putting some groundwork in for the company.”
Research Your Coaches
Alex Morono went on to detail how big of a fan he was of Diego, especially during the peak of his career. Unfortunately it is hard to keep feeling that way, under the current circumstances of his career.
That said, Alex implored other athletes to carefully research anybody they plan on employing as a coach. He even offered to do the research for parents that reach out to him for their kids.
“If anything, parents or their kids, do some research on the coaches. And if you don’t know, message me and I’ll do the research and let you know. It makes me so mad when creepy adults lead their students astray. I’ve seen some good coaching and I’ve seen some bad coaching in my career,” Morono said.
“And that’s one thing, I’ll go into gyms in the area and ask about the coach, read the literature. And they see my ears and a lot of guys know I fight around town. And a lot of people don’t like that I do that, but you gotta keep the quality good and you can’t show – if some kid is getting bullied and they try to fight with it and get beat up. That’s just bad news all around. Legitimacy in coaching in martial arts is very attainable today. It’s important that people are finding the right coaches.”
What do you think of these remarks from Alex Morono? Who would you like to see him fight next, following this big win over Donald Cerrone?
