Daniel Cormier heard himself being introduced as the UFC heavyweight and light heavyweight champion, and he interrupted to say that he probably will not be referred to that way for long.
No, Cormier is not expecting to lose a fight. He is simply resigned to being stripped of his 205-pound belt by the UFC.
“I imagine they’re going to take that belt,” Cormier said Monday on Ariel Helwani’s MMA show, “because I am scheduled to fight Brock [Lesnar at heavyweight]. I can’t fight at 205 first, so I’m pretty sure that they will take that title.”
Cormier went on to say the UFC initially told him it was going to strip him in order to book Alexander Gustafsson against Yoel Romero in a title fight. Now that the promotion has shifted its focus to a Dec. 29 rematch between Gustafsson and Jon Jones, Cormier said, “I imagine it is going to be for the belt.”
Cormier acknowledged that his relationship with the UFC has recently turned “very tense” as it became apparent whom the title opportunity now would be going to. His bitter rival, Jones, is set to return from a United States Anti-Doping Agency suspension following his second drug test failure, which resulted in last year’s victory over Cormier being changed to no contest. Previously, Jones had been stripped of the title and suspended by the UFC in 2015 after his arrest for a hit-and-run accident that injured a pregnant woman.
“You just kind of question your approach to everything, you know?” said Cormier. “You kind of wonder if trying to maintain a level of professionalism and a certain type of life is ideal, because it does not seem as though it will have benefited in this circumstance.”
In his discussions with the UFC about having his title taken away so it could be put on the line for a Gustafsson-Romero bout, Cormier said, “One of the things I asked for as a competitor is that if they do take that belt, just guarantee me a title fight upon the result of the fight that those guys will have.” He now wants the same with the Jones-Gustafsson winner.
Why doesn’t Cormier just step in now and welcome Jones back to the Octagon himself? That could not happen within the UFC’s December timeframe for a light heavyweight title bout, he said, because the broken hand he suffered in his historic heavyweight title victory over Stipe Miocic in July — the fifth broken hand of his career — is slow in healing.
Instead, Cormier is hoping for the Lesnar bout to happen in January. He is willing to let the Jones fight wait because of the financial windfall that comes from a date with Lesnar, a WWE star and former UFC champ who headlined two of the six most lucrative pay shows in UFC history.
“If a fight with Brock Lesnar for the amount of money that that brings and the prestige that that brings is your fallback plan,” said Cormier, “that’s a pretty good one to have.”
Then comes a third fight with Jones, said Cormier, to close out his career and, he hopes, enhance his legacy. Cormier has been adamant that he will retire by his 40th birthday, which is March 20. He acknowledged Monday that he might have to be loose with that deadline, because he cannot leave the sport without fighting Jones one more time.
“I can’t turn this off,” he said. “It’s what makes me uniquely me: my competitiveness and my desire to fight and compete against the best in the world.”
Cormier does not deny that Jones is one of the best in the world, but the champ insists on adding one other label.
“He’s just a cheater,” said Cormier. “And ultimately that fault — that he’s a cheater — does not deter me from wanting to compete against him again.”