Tony Ferguson: Almost Retired Following His UFC 274 Defeat

Tony Ferguson appeared on Submission Radio and discussed his recent loss at UFC 274.

Ferguson suffered a loss to Michael Chandler in a featured bout.

“He had the flexibility, he went for it, I wasn’t paying attention,” Ferguson said. “(Expletive) man, it’s just one of those things where I knew. But I had to go back and I talked to my Dad, I talked to my coaches, and I said if I knew that I didn’t have the gumption or the will to want to go anymore, if I didn’t do good in that first round, I would have called it quits.

“I would have said, (expletive) this, I’m out, I’m retiring, I’m going to go find something different, I’ll coach everybody to be at this high level and that’s it. But when I went back and I watched the fight, and I remember reviewing everything, it was like something happened, something clicked in me.

“It was like in that movie Kung Fu Hustle. He took so much damage, where when he healed, it’s like his chi level cleared. Everything just cleared and everything just started making sense with him and just his body started reacting different. And that’s how it’s been for me in the last year and a half. I mean, with the Gaethje fight, taking a lot of damage in that one, but I went all the way. I wanted to show the world how tough we were. I didn’t even get knocked down.

“And then in the Oliveira fight, I didn’t even do jiu jitsu for that. I took the fight and just the things that happened with COVID and not being able to bring in my whole team, we didn’t practice jiu jitsu. No excuses, I lost, that was my fault. And the Dariush thing was the exact same thing.

“It was just a lot of different instances where I wasn’t ready. God said, man, this isn’t you’re time yet, and he also said with this one too. He said, it’s not your time yet too. So, four, I guess. You can’t have a win streak without a losing streak. So, here I am. I have a TKO on my record, I have a submission record, you know what I mean. I’ve been put out, knocked out, I’ve lost by TKO, I’ve lost by decision. It’s a pain in the ass to be able to look at these losses, but like I said, if I didn’t have the will and the want to be able to do that and then know that when Dana said I looked phenomenal in that first round, I looked really good, I would have just called it quits.

“But right now I’m fucking hungry, man. I found myself back in the gym hitting the bag really light, not going too hard. This morning I didn’t wake up with a headache. I felt fucking phenomenal this morning, I felt really good. I’ve been eating really well, I haven’t been treating my body like shit or my mental game like shit. I’ve really been focusing on what I can control, and you know, shoutout to the world. The only things that we can control is our heartrate and our breathing. The rest is up to the big guys upstairs.”