Junior Dos Santos Still Looking For Stipe Miocic In November UFC Return
Its been over nine months now since we last seen former UFC heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos set foot inside the Octagon.
The Brazilian striking specialist hasn’t competed since his failed attempt to recapture the heavyweight title from Cain Velasquez at UFC 166 and after being setback with some unfortunate injuries, the 30-year old now has his eyes set on a return in late 2014.
“”Cigano” was expected to face off against Stipe Miocic in his return at The Ultimate Fighter Brazil 3 Finale but due to a hand injury he had to drop out of the fight. Subsequently, he was replaced by Fabio Maldonado who Miocic knocked out in just thirty-five seconds.
Dos Santos says his hand is fine now, however, he is starting to have problems with his knee. The injury has kept him out of the gym but he’s back training again now and is eying a return towards the end of the year:
“When I had to stop training because of my broken hand, I felt a pain in my knee.” dos Santos told MMAFighting in a recent interview. “I did all the exams and it showed nothing, so my doctor asked me to do some rehab.
He cleared me to slowly return to training now to see how I’m going to feel.I will schedule my next fight when I feel 100 percent ready. I talked to Joe Silva and explained everything to him, and I’m positive that I will be ready to fight again in November.”
And if its still an option, dos Santos would like to fight Miocic who’s 6-1 now in the UFC’s heavyweight division.
“Miocic is doing a good job, coming off great wins. I was focused on fighting him before, trained for him, so I think it would be a good fight for me. It would be a beautiful fight for the fans as well.
A fight between Miocic and I would be really interesting because he’s a wrestler with a good stand-up game, so he would bring a challenge to me as I would bring to him.”
To be fair, matching up the former champion with Miocic makes the most sense given his current run. Dos Santos is still a clear cut above the vast majority of the talent-hungry division, so there’s not much point booking him against anyone outside the Top 5.
Who do you think “Cigano” should fight in his return?
