Joanna Jedrzejczyk claims her weight cut had adverse affects.

At UFC 217, Strawweight “Thug” Rose Namajunas achieved a spectacular first-round knockout over longtime champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk. Now Joanna is citing weight issues to explain the loss.

Joanna was undefeated in the UFC until the Rose fight, and although she often discussed moving up to 125, the depletion of cutting to 115 never obviously manifested in her fights. She routinely succeeded in 5-round wars, and seemed better conditioned than her opponents in the later rounds.

In a video interview with Przemys?aw Osiak of Przeglad Sportowy in Poland, Joanna explained the difficult weight cut preceding the loss.

According to Joanna, she was forced to cut 16 pounds in 14 hours. Translation comes via MMAFighting.

“It was an accident what happened. I know that I should have won the match, and I know that I could have won the match. … The people that I was working with led me to a critical state.

“I told my doctor I need to do whatever to weigh 115. I don’t care if I have to be in a tub with whatever temperature. It gets harder and harder as you get older to cut weight.”

The fiasco has prompted Joanna to part ways with Perfecting Athletes, her nutrition company.

“The mistakes that they made were unforgivable,” Jedrzejczyk said. … “I can’t work with those kinds of people.”

Some are calling this just an example of a fighter looking for someone to blame other than themselves after a loss. The claim that a faulty weight cut is entirely to blame for a first round KO is a bit hard to take. This also comes after Joanna’s bizarre assertion that she did not tap to strikes just before the stoppage, which she clearly did. But then again, perhaps she is right and what came through on the camera did not do her situation justice. In any case, she will have a chance to prove herself right, as she has been granted an immediate title shot and rematch with Rose.

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