Daniel Cormier endured a unanimous decision setback to Stipe Miocic in their trilogy match at UFC 252 last night. Both competitors showed flashes of brilliance early on. Especially Miocic, who succeeded to drop Cormier towards the end of the second round and looked to have all the momentum. However, Cormier would go on to hurt his left eye and things weren’t helped either when Miocic accidentally poked it towards the end of the third round which referee Marc Goddard missed and later apologized for. But, according to UFC President Dana White, the eye poke suffered by Cormier is no excuse for the loss.
Dana White on Cormier Eye Poke at UFC 252
Dana fielded questions from the media after UFC 252. During the post-fight press conference, White expressed his thoughts on how the trilogy fight played out. He also made it clear that while eye pokes were present, it’s not an excuse to use for a loss.
“You can’t look at the eye poke and take that away,” said Dana in regards to Stipe’s victory. “There were two eye pokes – they both got poked in the eye, and that eye was hurt before the poke. We’ve got a big group text that goes on, and I was like, ‘There’s something wrong with Cormier’s eye,’ and then he got poked after that. That didn’t help, but they both got poked – you can’t use that as an excuse.
Analyzing an Instant Classic
Next, Dana spoke about the fight overall. Although there were eye pokes, the fight was still a classic heavyweight matchup for the ages.
“It was an awesome fight,” White said. “I had it 2-2 going into the last round. It was the fight everybody thought it was going to be, and it was exciting. How tough are both of those guys? I mean, both guys get poked in the eye, both guys got rocked. They fought their hearts out. It was an incredible heavyweight championship.”
Do fans of the sport believe that the eye poke affected the outcome of the fight? Or, is Dana White’s analysis of the situation accurate?
