John Makdessi Not Planning To Retire After All

In an interview with MMA Junkie, John Makdessi said that he’s not going to retire after all. He posted on Facebook in May hinting that he could be done, but now explains that he was just upset about his loss to Donald Cerrone at UFC 187, which also left him with a broken jaw. Here are highlights:

On what he wrote on Facebook: “Sometimes as a fighter, it’s a rollercoaster ride. I wrote some stuff on my fan page, and it was really more to express how I was felt.”

On if he ever considered retirement: “The issue wasn’t retirement; I was questioning the weight class. The 155-pound class is the hardest with the most talented fighters. I am the majority of the time the smaller guy in terms of height and reach advantage. But it’s not easy for me to get down to 155. But at the end of the day, I wasn’t looking at retirement at all.”

On what he learned from the Cerrone fight: “I’m always looking for excitement, and then I’m fighting Donald Cerrone for a title, one of the toughest guys, and I fought him the whole fight, right in the center of the cage. It’s a part of the game; it’s 50-50, and unfortunately, I fractured my jaw. But I proved to myself that I can stand and bang with the best fighters in the world.”