Kamaru Usman has a few losses on his record, but the former UFC welterweight champion is proud to say he usually made a good showing in every one of those fights. Following a lopsided loss to Dricus du Plessis in the UFC Oklahoma City main event, Usman questions whether he should continue fighting or not.
In the aftermath of his loss, Usman isn’t spending much time thinking about whether he wants to stay at middleweight or return to welterweight; instead, making an honest assessment of his performance, the 39-year-old veteran says he needs to sit with his team and make a decision on booking another fight or possibly walking away from the sport for good.
“Right now, I just have to sit with the coaches, sit with the team, assess everything,” Usman said on his Pound-for-Pound podcast. “Assess the place where I’m at in my career. Just all in all, see whether it’s worth continuing to do this. Whether it’s worth continuing to put them through that.”
Usman detailed how he’s always made a good accounting for himself in past losses — including his initial rematch against Leon Edwards where he was cruising to a decision victory until he was caught with a stunning head kick in the final round.
Every loss is a tough pill to swallow, but Usman was proud he never looked overwhelmed or out of his league against any past opponent. While he doesn’t feel like du Plessis just beat him up for five rounds, he understands that’s the visual so many people saw this past Saturday night.
“Listen, I’ve never really gone out there and not represented them appropriately, myself and my coaches,” Usman said. “This one was a hard one because I felt like I didn’t do that. The Khamzat [Chimaev] fight, it’s like I took that on a week’s notice and if I had two more rounds, it’s iffy, who knows what could have happened. The Leon [Edwards rematch], I think I represented myself well until that last minute took that kick to the head. The third one, I probably shouldn’t have been in there but I pushed it, I said you know what I’m hard-headed, I’m going to go in [and fight] and halfway through that fight I found myself again.
“There was something to build off of for those fights. This one to the untrained eye, looks like I bit off more than I could chew. Just a fair and honest assessment. Even though I may not feel that on the inside, it looked that way and I don’t like that.”
Usman didn’t set a timetable on when he wants to decide what’s next, but he knows difficult decisions likely await him in the future.
If he retires, Usman will go down as one of the greatest welterweights of all time and is a guaranteed UFC Hall of Famer. For now, he is waiting to speak to his coaches and teammates before coming to a decision about booking another fight or hanging up his gloves.
“I’ve got to really go back, sit with the team, sit with family and assess and decide,” Usman said. “This is just as difficult of a place to be, when we’ve achieved so much and you’ve got so much highs in the sport, when you start to feel the lows it’s not that great.
“Because you hold yourself to a certain standard. So when you start to feel those things, it just puts you in a really difficult and really tough place to make a tough and potentially permanent decision.”
