Rafael dos Anjos pulled off his gloves inside the Octagon after a second-round TKO loss to Alexander Hernandez at UFC 332. That gesture usually means a fighter is done. He hasn’t confirmed anything.
The 41-year-old never got a microphone after the prelim, so there was no farewell speech in the cage. Fans online immediately started guessing. One wondered if the UFC simply ran out of time to hand him the mic. Another worried he’d retired without the send-off a guy with his résumé deserves.
Dos Anjos filled the silence later with a video on his Instagram stories. “Unfortunately, I couldn’t win tonight, but I’m just blessed I’m able to compete again after a rough two years, three surgeries,” he said. He blamed a lead hook he ate “the last three seconds of the first round” and added, “Alex did a great job, and life moves on.”
That last line will get read a dozen ways. There’s no retirement announcement in it.
How it went down
For most of the first five minutes, the old man looked like the old man. Dos Anjos walked Hernandez backward, kept the pressure on and landed a clean hook to the body. Then the late shot in the first round stunned him, and he never really shook it off. Early in Round 2, Hernandez, 34, dropped him with a stiff jab and followed him to the mat. Dos Anjos got back up and walked into a right hook. The referee waved it off shortly after.
It was his first fight in nearly two years. Essentially Sports reported that the layoff included multiple knee surgeries. Dos Anjos came in on a three-fight skid. Now it’s four.
The résumé
This was his 50th pro fight and his 37th in the UFC, almost 18 years after a November 2008 debut that started with two straight losses. He rebounded with five wins in a row before Khabib Nurmagomedov stopped the run in 2014. Then came three more wins, including Benson Henderson and Nate Diaz, and a title shot he turned into a beatdown of Anthony Pettis for the lightweight belt. He defended it against Donald Cerrone, lost it to Eddie Alvarez, dropped one to Tony Ferguson, then moved up to welterweight and beat Tarec Saffiedine, Neil Magny and Robbie Lawler before running into Colby Covington and Kamaru Usman.
He entered UFC 332 at 32-17 with 16 stoppage wins. He leaves it 32-18.
Quick take
I’ll take a guy who answers straight over a guy who teases, and dos Anjos sort of did both here. The gloves said one thing and the Instagram video said “life moves on,” which is about as close to a shrug as a former champ gets. He came back from three surgeries at 41 and won a round against a younger, live opponent, so there’s nothing sad about how he went out, if he went out. A fighter who beat Pettis, Cerrone and Lawler doesn’t owe anybody a fifth straight loss to prove a point. If the gloves stay on that canvas, he walks away with the belt on his record and his head mostly intact, and that’s a better exit than most guys with 50 fights ever get.
