Biggest premature retirements in mma

[Travis Alexander]

Nah the fundamentals in boxing don’t translate well into mma

He trained MMA for years including sparring with K1 strikers and wrestling with all time greats like Randy Couture. He would have been fine. We were at Legends MMA in Hollywood. Bas and Randy owned the gym (pre Xtreme Couture) and Karo, Rampage, Mayhem, etc etc trained with us it was a killer squad once upon a time. Also it is the original home of Eddie Bravo’s 10th planet Bjj. Fun times and I was super blessed to come up around such incredible talent early.

 

[Travis Alexander]

Almost 40 year old fighting regional fights probably wasn't what UFC was looking to invest in at that time.
If he could have got in he could have made waves tho

He was 34/35 and fighting in Icon promotion at the time (Robbie Lawler and Mayhem were fighting icon at the same time) it was better than a “regional level event” and used to have some extremely talented MMA fighters back in the day.

 

[ryun253]

Stun Gun Kim.

What happened to him?

He's pretty popular in Korean variety shows, also has his own YouTube channel going . Seems like he's just training fighters lately

 

[Daniel_LaRusso]

Zabit will be up there if he doesn’t come back.

it’s also a shame Ricardo Arona never came to ufc after pride.

 

[davidlemonparty]

Zabit will be up there if he doesn’t come back.

it’s also a shame Ricardo Arona never came to ufc after pride.

Yeh real sad about Arona. UFC at the time would've been a great fit for him. Vitamins OK, grappling friendly rules, big cage to work in, no shitty restarts, good looking big dude getting that marketing push.

 

[davidlemonparty]

In the modern recently era, I think CCC was earlier than Khabib. It was sad khabib retired when he did, but we gotta remember Khabib had been a pro MMA fighter since 2008 (13 years) and in the UFC since Jan 2012. So 9 full years in the UFC. He was just marred with some inactivity and missed fights. That's a pretty good run.

CCC on the other hand was only doing MMA for like 8 years and had really only hit his stride the few years of this imo. He had more to give and show imo. Would've liked to see him get a few more bantamweight defences.

 

[wwkirk]

I'm talking about guys who left big question marks on their career potential when retiring... they were on a streak or hadn't peaked yet and abruptly retired

Most obvious recent example is Zabit

2 I was thinking about recently:

TJ Grant- retired under semi mysterious circumstances on a 5 fight win streak, including finishing #3 ranked Gray Maynard at the time so I think he retired as a top 5 LW having never had the opportunity to fight for the title

Cole Konrad- giant D1 wrestling champ, Brock Lesnar training partner, Bellator HW champ, retired undefeated after going 9-0


I'd like to compile some more examples like this

First page, no mention of Cejudo?

 

[moosaev]

I would've liked to have seen Khabib get a few more defenses in and keep the haters seething but losing his dad was definitely a strike to his very core.

I don't think the haters can seethe any more than they currently are, it's pretty amazing, they're in complete meltdown mode.

 

[Nobru]

I'm talking about guys who left big question marks on their career potential when retiring... they were on a streak or hadn't peaked yet and abruptly retired

Most obvious recent example is Zabit

2 I was thinking about recently:

TJ Grant- retired under semi mysterious circumstances on a 5 fight win streak, including finishing #3 ranked Gray Maynard at the time so I think he retired as a top 5 LW having never had the opportunity to fight for the title

Cole Konrad- giant D1 wrestling champ, Brock Lesnar training partner, Bellator HW champ, retired undefeated after going 9-0


I'd like to compile some more examples like this

Khabib and GSP are my undisputed choices. GSP was starting to have his ass whooped and got bitchy scared. Khabib even worse. The mofo is a complete pussy "oh i hav a pefect recor" fuck him. We want entertainment. We wanna see stars beat people and get beaten. Blood spilling. Good thing these fuckers are gone
actual champions are much more entertaining

 

[Masturbin]

Chad Mendez had a few fights in him still.

Imo prime Chad could give a very hard fight to Volk.

 

[nintey]

I'm talking about guys who left big question marks on their career potential when retiring... they were on a streak or hadn't peaked yet and abruptly retired

Most obvious recent example is Zabit

2 I was thinking about recently:

TJ Grant- retired under semi mysterious circumstances on a 5 fight win streak, including finishing #3 ranked Gray Maynard at the time so I think he retired as a top 5 LW having never had the opportunity to fight for the title

Cole Konrad- giant D1 wrestling champ, Brock Lesnar training partner, Bellator HW champ, retired undefeated after going 9-0


I'd like to compile some more examples like this

Kole was unimpressive looking but actually moved well for his size, on top of that he was really putting effort into his striking, went 3 rounds standing with Paul Buentello and looked fine.

If he would have gotten back in shape and kept fighting he had huge potential. But Bellator couldn't get him fights so he quit to work a normal job.

Good for him but it would have been interesting to see what he could have done.

 

[wolfss]

He trained MMA for years including sparring with K1 strikers and wrestling with all time greats like Randy Couture. He would have been fine. We were at Legends MMA in Hollywood. Bas and Randy owned the gym (pre Xtreme Couture) and Karo, Rampage, Mayhem, etc etc trained with us it was a killer squad once upon a time. Also it is the original home of Eddie Bravo’s 10th planet Bjj. Fun times and I was super blessed to come up around such incredible talent early.

Damn. That’s legit. The ufc makes moves more on what they can squeeze money out of. They steer away from dudes that wanna make what they are worth.

 

[Mixedfights]

Khabin doesn't count because he definitely peaked in my opinion. Won the belt, couple defenses etc. There aren't that many questions or what ifs about his potential... just really how he would match against Chucky Olives

He had the belt for 3 fights and quit. He wanted to protect that "0" and everybody knows it. He could have beat all comers for a couple years then challenged himself at 170, but none of that was ever going to happen even if both his parents we're still alive. He accomplished what he wanted and got out before it became too tough and he could possibly get beat.

 

[JonnyBonesPharmacist]

Cejudo, for sure. He did alot, but had/has alot more to do

 

[Vehap1]

GSP decided to continue when he met his equal, roided Hendricks

 

[corrupted]

Jeremy “half man half amazing” Williams
Professional boxer with 49 fights (holds record for fastest KO in history, and most KO’s in amateur boxing history with 101 I believe). Entered MMA and went undefeated before retiring when Chuck was champ. He was offered a spot on TuF and felt like it was disrespectful since he was making hundreds of thousands in boxing and wanted a top contender entry fight in the UFC. Negotiations broke down and he ended up going back to boxing. Also should add that he was a state wrestling champ in HS and was a main sparring partner for fighters like Couture and Rampage and I’ve seen him day in day out just demolish everyone on the feet. Plus his wrestling and Bjj were pretty solid as well. UFC LHW division would have been lucky to have him at that time.

Great Post. Hadn't heard of him previously.

 

[NicholasJBasile]

David Terrell and Kyle Conrad come to mind -- Dave was my old coach, and I've never trained with anyone as talented as him in the ground.

Steve Mocco got in the game late and had a loss against an undersized mediocre opponent after gassing, but I feel he could've been a monster. He's now a coach with ATT.

Dustin Hazelett was a brilliant ground fighter, but didn't respond well to being hit -- he was very young when he retired. I feel he could've rounded his game out in time.

Phillip Miller retired undefeated including a win over Jake Shields to become a cop I believe.

Ruling Gardner only had one fight (with weird rules, secretly), but honestly not sure the fight really said much of his potential for fighting. I think he just got paid a bunch of money.

Mark Schultz bad one fight handily defeating Gary Goodridge and then called it a day.

 

[Mebetter]

Alan Belcher, Tim Kennedy, and Roger Gracie, I think those 3 still had more good fights left when they retired.
People will get butthurt at this but I think Ronda could still beat 95% of the women currently fighting.

 

[NicholasJBasile]

Jeremy “half man half amazing” Williams
Professional boxer with 49 fights (holds record for fastest KO in history, and most KO’s in amateur boxing history with 101 I believe). Entered MMA and went undefeated before retiring when Chuck was champ. He was offered a spot on TuF and felt like it was disrespectful since he was making hundreds of thousands in boxing and wanted a top contender entry fight in the UFC. Negotiations broke down and he ended up going back to boxing. Also should add that he was a state wrestling champ in HS and was a main sparring partner for fighters like Couture and Rampage and I’ve seen him day in day out just demolish everyone on the feet. Plus his wrestling and Bjj were pretty solid as well. UFC LHW division would have been lucky to have him at that time.

I remember this guy -- he was a legit prospect and he had a solid ground game as well, as I recall-- solid pick

 

[NicholasJBasile]

He’s been my boxing coach since I was like 14 years old so I have a lot of love for him and have seen how great he is day in and day out. He brought me to all the big camps with him back in the day. Tito even paid him to help him prepare for a fight vs Chuck and we went to Big Bear. Let’s just say Jeremy would have been a problem for anyone in the world at LHW.

Wow this is super cool that you trained with him. I can't blame him for his decisions. I bet he would've done some damage at 205.