Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone and Joe Lauzon will not be booked a third time.
That’s the message from UFC President Dana White, who confirmed the promotion will move on from the matchup after Lauzon suffered a knee injury that forced him out of the fight with Cerrone just hours before UFC Austin began.
The first time around it was Cerrone, who fell ill before UFC 274 and that ultimately canceled the showdown against Lauzon.
“That thing’s getting like Tony [Ferguson] and Khabib [Nurmagomedov],” White said at the UFC Austin post-fight press conference. “No. I won’t book that fight again .”
It is disappointing news for Cerrone & Lauzon who both were excited about this matchup, as they have combined for 33 after-fight bonuses in their legendary careers.
According to Cerrone, he actually found out the fight was cancelled from a text message he received from Lauzon that told him about the problem he had with his knee, which first happened after the weigh-ins on Friday.
“It’s a crazy sport we’re in, and you’ve just got to go with the punches,” Cerrone said on the UFC Austin post-fight show. Joe, I’m sure is a great guy. It’s not like he’s just making something up. I said Joe, I know you wouldn’t just pull anything so heal up, brother, and we’ll make it happen one day.”
Judging from White’s comments Cerrone should not get excited about Lauzon crossing the octagon. However, he may try to schedule a fight on an upcoming UFC card.
“They’re already in the talks for here real soon,” Cerrone revealed. “They offered me one really soon, and I said we’re going to have to talk about a catchweight for sure. I’ve shown I can make the weight back-to-back. It’s not the weight. We’ll soon see.
“I’m going to talk to [UFC matchmaker] Sean [Shelby] here tonight and we’re going to figure it out. I’m sure you guys will see me in the next couple weeks.”
White confirmed the same when addressing Cerrone’s next fight, saying the veteran lightweight won’t be able to get down to 155 pounds again so soon after making the cut in both May and June.
“He just cut that weight yesterday,” White said. “We wanted to see if he wanted to fight in July. He doesn’t want to cut weight again so he won’t fight in July. We’ll figure something else out for him.”
Cerrone wants to compete two more times before calling it a career with more than 50 fights on his resume dating back to his 2006 MMA debut.
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