Tony Ferguson Should Be Cut from the UFC Roster
I keep scratching my head with this one. With Tony Ferguson, you have a fan favorite who has been with the UFC since 2011. He has seen the mountaintop as an interim champion and is currently at the lowest point of his UFC career having lost his fifth fight on Saturday. He still has his fans who love to watch him fight, but at 38 and on such a losing streak, is it even worth keeping him around? The more I think about it, the answer becomes clearer. Ferguson should 100% be cut from the UFC roster, and you shouldn’t think twice about it. The dude is washed.
It is always painful watching fighters you used to admire and clamor to watch fight just break down into nothingness. That’s me with Tony Ferguson. I loved Ferguson. I was like everyone else. His fights with guys like Rafael dos Anjos, his submission win against Kevin Lee, and even his war with Anthony Pettis showed fight fans why they should love this guy. He was the boogeyman in the lightweight division — no one wanted a piece of him. He was on a 12-fight win streak that saw him finish fights in all sorts of ways, proving he was among the best at what he did.
First came the string of bad luck. Most notably, and arguably the most famous reason a fighter as missed a fight, was Ferguson tripping over an electrical cable and rupturing his LCL in his knee, causing him to miss his fight with Khabib Nurmagomedov. That was the fourth cancellation of that fight. Fight fans only wanted one fight, and it was prime Ferguson versus prime Nurmagomedov. We never got it, and it remains one of the biggest missed opportunities in MMA history. That will forever go down as the biggest one that got away.
The thing now is he is just washed. I know that is hard to hear, but he is. The dude just doesn’t have it in him anymore. You could maybe contribute some of it to his age. At 38, there aren’t a lot of top-level fighters around. There also aren’t a lot of fighters in their late 30’s fighting guys like Justin Gaethje, Michael Chandler, Nate Diaz, or Charles Oliveira. That is four of his last five losses. His fight with Beneil Dariush also was not very close. You could make the argument he hasn’t looked good since June of 2019 when he fought Donald Cerrone and won via doctor stoppage, his last win in the UFC.
His skills have diminished dramatically. His speed just isn’t there anymore. He telegraphs almost everything he does, making it nearly impossible to land anything super clean and with power. He has to sacrifice power to utilize any speed he might have left. Ferguson is too tough for his own good as well. Tony Ferguson will willingly stand there and trade, knowing good and well he is going to lose that striking exchange. Plus, the dude is flat-out strange. His personality has shifted. I can imagine there aren’t a lot of reporters who seek out interviews with the dude anymore. If he can’t sell fights and looks bad in said fights, what’s the point of having him around?
It is a hard pill to swallow. I get it. No one wants to see people get old or lose their skills, especially when they were once beloved like Tony Ferguson was. But the time has come. The writing is on the wall. Ferguson is beyond washed, and Dana White should do what’s best for everyone involved and cut “El Cucuy”. There will be some backlash, of course, but the sooner this is realized the better.
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