Cain Velasquez returned to the octagon at UFC on ESPN 1 after two-and-a-half years away, only to last 26 seconds with Francis Ngannou before losing by knockout. It was one of those shocking moments that wasn’t so shocking when you consider what happened.
Velasquez’s career has been ravaged by injuries. Of course he would blow out his knee in the opening moments of his comeback fight. His body hates him, and he’s cursed to never fulfill his destiny as the greatest UFC heavyweight of all time.
In the immediate aftermath of Velasquez’s loss Sunday night, a Twitter user pointed something out about Velasquez’s open workout two days prior: He might’ve tweaked his knee?
You be the judge (7:46 mark):
From the looks of it, the former two-time UFC heavyweight champion slips when he steps with his left foot to throw a punch. In that moment, he signals that he’s done. But whether or not he tweaked his left knee, only Velasquez would know. In the wake of how it buckled during the Ngannou fight, it’s understandable why people would wonder.
Velasquez’s head coach, Javier Mendez, was on MMAjunkie Radio on Monday night. For what it’s worth, Velasquez never told him anything about injuring himself during the open workout.
“No, he never said nothing to me about it if that happened,” Mendez said. “He didn’t say a word to me about that. No, nothing. So if that did happen, he didn’t tell me. And I would hope he would’ve told me. He didn’t tell me nothing.”
Short of Velasquez coming out and saying one way or the other, that might be the closest thing we get to a sure answer.
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