Paulo Costa won the UFC 278 main event with a three-round victory. After that, Luke Rockhold declared his retirement.
It was an intense fight until the end, but Costa kept causing more damage round by round. The judges gave him the fight with the 30-27 scorecards in his favor. Rockhold took off his gloves after the fight was over and the judges announced that his career had ended.
“I’m been through so much the last three years,” Rockhold said. Thank you UFC. I can’t do this s*** anymore. I’m f****** old.”
Rockhold was clearly not at his best as he was unable to keep up with Costa in their intense fight. The middleweights were thrown everything they have at one another.
Rockhold attempted to take down Costa early, but he was unsuccessful. Costa began hurling punches at Rockhold with an inordinate amount of force. Rockhold was able to escape, but Costa kept going after him with heavy and powerful shots in his pursuit for an early knockout.
Another shot clipped Rockhold before Costa decided to take the fight down to the ground where he began applying pressure from the top. With Rockhold holding on, Costa advanced into the mount but he lost the position just seconds later as the middleweights exploded back to the feet.
Rockhold landed his best strikes in the opening round with several stinging kicks to the body as Costa smiled and just invited him to throw more. Rockhold, whose nose was mangled by blood running down his face as he walked to the corner of the ring, could feel his breath coming out.
As the second round started, Rockhold came out with a frantic pace but Costa weathered the storm. Still, Rockhold was managing to throw some big shots even as he looked like his gas tank was nearly drained.
With time ticking away, Costa started concentrating more and more on the body including one thunderous kick that reverberated off Rockhold’s midsection. Costa and Rockhold were both running on fumes, just unloading everything on one another.
Rockhold’s shoddy takedown of Costa proved to be too late and he eventually lost his fight with him. Rockhold managed to survive a submission as he moved backwards on top and literally rub his head on Costa until it was over.
Costa was aware that he had done enough for the win and celebrated it with his UFC victory.
“He was a surprise to me.” Costa stated about Rockhold. “He got a lot of creative shots on the face, on the chin. He has .”
a great chin, despite people saying he isn’t.
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