This Friday night at UFC 207, Cody Garbrandt challenges Dominick Cruz for Cruz’s UFC Bantamweight title. It’s an intriguing clash of striking styles, with the fancy footwork and high-level movement of Cruz against the more explosive KO power of Garbrandt.
For some analysts trying to break down the fight, one of the key talking points is a Garbrandt fight from 2012, 10 months before he turned pro. In Feb. 2012, Garbrandt was 4-1 as an amateur and taking on the 3-0 Jerrell Hodge. What’s significant is the end of the fight – here, the now 10-0 as a pro Garbrandt not only loses, but gets knocked clean out.
Watch the full video of Garbrandt’s KO loss to Hodge above, or here on YouTube. The KO comes seconds into round 3 – skip to the 14 minute mark to just see the finish.
So what to take away from this fight? Some see it as a sign that Garbrandt is weak-chinned, likely to get put down once a serious UFC fighter lands a clean shot. After all, if a fighter who has yet to amount to anything as a pro (Hodge is today 2-1 in his pro career) can knock him out, why not the best Bantamweight in the world? Others see it as largely irrelevant – a sign that Garbrandt made a mistake when he was still developing, nothing more.
What’s your take BE faithful – does this loss show us anything about Garbrandt, and if so, will we see that play out Friday night?
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