Luke Rockhold Names The One Fighter He Wishes He Fought

Luke Rockhold has proven himself to be one of the middleweights we’ve seen in recent years. He captured both the Strikeforce and UFC titles, and has wins over the likes of ‘Jacare’ Souza, Michael Bisping, Lyoto Machida and Chris Weidman. But there remains one opponent he regrets never facing, Anderson Silva.

Silva is considered to be one of the greatest MMA fighters of all-time. Speaking on the Major Waves Podcast (as transcribed by MMA Junkie), Rockhold said he would have almost certainly have faced Anderson if he had have beaten Vitor Belfort in his UFC debut, seven years ago.

“I wish I would have had the chance to fight Anderson. Especially in that time, I think I would have beat him. I don’t know – I think there’s just promotional reasons. They didn’t see it quite right at that time. If I would have beat Vitor, then me and Anderson would have fought right away, straight away. But then I had to go reprove myself through the ranks after that loss.”

Once Rockhold had worked his way back to the top, he defeated Chris Weidman to claim the UFC middleweight title, from the man who had dethroned Silva.

Rockhold and Weidman were scheduled to rematch at UFC 199 but after the ‘All American’ was forced out due to a last minute injury, Michael Bisping stepped in on less than two weeks and knocked out Luke in the first round.

After Bisping retired in 2018, Rockhold has comes to terms that he won’t get his trilogy with the Brit.

“I think I just kind of came to the conclusion where I’m just content with it,” Rockhold said. “Obviously, there’s easy fights where I’d like them back and I knew that I could have wrote that story differently – like my second fight with Bisping. But I’m not going to get that. I’m a realist.”

After losing his light heavyweight debut to Jan Blachowicz at UFC 239 by way of a devastating KO, Rockhold is all but retired and seems focused on different things besides fighting.

“I’m taking a leave of absence,” Rockhold said. “I’m just kind of doing my thing right now – getting life organized, getting things together. It’s good to be back on the West Coast. I was training out in Florida and it’s just – Florida’s tough. It’s hot, it’s humid – it’s a different lifestyle.”

Do you think we’ll ever see Luke Rockhold inside the Octagon again?


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