Stipe Miocic Has Hilarious Response For ‘Phantom Tap’ Claim
Stipe Miocic successfully retained his heavyweight crown last night (September 11, 2016) when he clashed with No. 3-ranked Alistair Overeem in the main event of UFC 203, but it didn’t come without a bit of controversy.
Immediately after the bout’s conclusion Overeem told UFC commentator Joe Rogan that he felt Miocic tap while locked into a guillotine choke, that Miocic would later escape and go on to finish his counterpart late in the first round.
Following the pay-per-view (PPV) event, courtesy of MMA Fighting, Miocic recounted when he initially heard of Overeem’s accusations that he tapped:
“I just remember signing my check and all that good stuff, and I heard boos,” Miocic explained. “I asked what they (the crowd) were booing about because I knew he (Overeem) was talking, and they told me that he said that I tapped out. I don’t remember tapping out, I just remember punching his face repeatedly until he was unconscious.”
The Croatian champ finds it hard to understand how Overeem would assume he tapped when in fact both his hands were on Overeem’s in attempt to slip free of the choke:
“I don’t know how I can tap out when I have two hands on his hands,” Miocic said. “But yeah he’s also not feeling too good right now. I mean, that’s terrible. He could really hurt me. He threw harder than I thought, he kicked harder than I thought, and you know, that was my own fault, but I knew everything that was coming.
“Listen, I trained for these kind of situations. He put me on my ass, you know. I felt fine, and he got me on that front headlock (guillotine choke) and I just kept scooting my right knee. I popped out, he didn’t like it, and then he gave me the opportunity to grab his leg, so I followed him and right when I got on top of him, game over.”
Watch Miocic detail the event here:
