Former UFC Heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez has an unfortunate story.
He entered the UFC in 2006, blazing through Heavyweights. Finally he captured the belt, knocking out Brock Lesnar, but immediately lost it via flash knockout to Junior Dos Santos. Over the next few years Cain battled his way back to the title shot winning several fights, including two rematches with JDS, the first of which re-won him the belt. However, fighting in Mexico City, Cain lost to Fabricio Werdum in a fight where he was clearly metabolically unprepared. His coach Javier Mendez took blame for the loss citing that he had not given Cain Velasquez enough time to acclimatize to Mexico City’s altitude.
Since that loss, Cain has fought once, a TKO victory over Travis Browne. The inactivity has been forced by a number of spinal injuries, but now it appears the living legend is back. Yesterday, on The MMA Hour, teammate and Lightheavyweight champion Daniel Cormier confirmed that Cain is back in the gym.
“He’s back to training, and it hurts, but it nothing’s felt better for a long time.”
As always, Cormier has nothing but high praise for his soft-spoken teammate.
“It does suck to have to go in there and work with Cain, because he’s so much better than everybody else that’s ever been around, but it’s good to have him, man. Just seeing him back doing what he loves to do, it’s amazing as a friend and as a fan of mixed martial arts, because if Cain gets back, you guys know what he does for the Heavyweight division. He makes for some very, very interesting and fun fights.”
He certainly does. Cain is nothing if not a championship caliber fighter. The current champion, Stipe Miocic, who won the belt of Werdum, will defend it against rising sensation Francis Ngannou early next year. However, the biggest priority for Cain right now is making sure he returns healthy.
“It’s a process,” Cormier said. “When you start dealing with some of the injuries that Cain has had, and I’ve seen this since wrestling — backs and necks and all those types of injuries — man, it takes time to recover. And I think, for a long time, Cain may have pushed himself when he should’ve rested, and I believe this time he’s actually taken the time to try to let himself heal, and I feel like this will be a chance for him to make a long, sustained run, much longer than he really has over the course of his career.”
That would be greatly welcome in the shallow Heavyweight division. But there are no easy fights at the top, and whomever Cain returns to fight, he will need to be at his best.
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