Here’s the question people are starting to ask about Henry Cejudo now that he’s headed into the third fight of his comeback tour without a victory in this post-post-retirement phase of his career: What is he here to do, exactly?
Cejudo is a former two-division UFC champion. He was an Olympic gold medalist wrestler before that. When he calls himself the greatest combat sports athlete in history, that’s not just the typical hype job from the self-proclaimed “King of Cringe.” He really does have a legitimate claim for that honor, and he’s as quick as ever to remind people.
“People, whether they want to hate it or love it, I did it in two of the hardest sports in the world,” Cejudo told me earlier this week. “I did it in two divisions, in three different weight classes. I mean, who else would be ahead of me? If you’re going to say [Alex] Pereira, dude, what? You can’t really compare GLORY Kickboxing, where they fight every weekend, to an Olympic gold medal. Are you kidding me?
“And I won two belts simultaneously, not one and then another. I’m proud of my accolades. Even Jon Jones said it. He said, ‘Henry you could be the greatest combat athlete of all time.’ And to me, I really don’t care what the fans think. I care about what the legends think.”
But all that is now officially the good old days for Cejudo.
In 2020, he retired as champion while simultaneously suggesting that UFC executives could change his mind with a pay raise. They never appeared to even consider that option, and instead moved on with business as usual before the blood was even dry on the canvas.
That was mostly fine by Cejudo, he said. A part of him had “fallen out of love” with MMA. He enjoyed his time away, he said. He also profited from it.
“I thought, ‘This is the right time for me to start my real estate ventures,’” Cejudo said.
“I’m in real estate now doing a really good job, finishing a couple of duplexes. I’m going to do two, six-unit apartment [buildings]. I’m doing really, really good.”
Still, he added, when it comes to money, couldn’t we all be doing better? Especially when we have kids to raise and mouths to feed?
“You want to give them better opportunities,” Cejudo said. “You want to enjoy the time that you have with them. If I had the money, I probably would never have come back. Quite honestly, if I had Khabib [Nurmagomedov] money, s***, I’d retire too.”
It’s a bit of a surprising admission coming from a former champ who keeps saying he still sees himself as a future one. To walk away as a two-division titleholder, spend a couple years in the duplex game, and then return to plug away as just another would-be contender, all for a few more paychecks? That’s hard to picture for a guy with both UFC belts and an Olympic gold medal already in his trophy case.
Cejudo just turned 38 years old, and he fights in one of the weight classes that is known to be particular unkind to fighters over 35. He hasn’t won a fight since crossing that threshold himself, though in fairness his two losses since un-retiring came against one former champ (Aljamain Sterling) and one current one (Merab Dvalishvili).
Now he’s in a familiar position for many aging ex-champions. Saturday’s UFC Seattle main event sees him take on Song Yadong, a fighter 11 years younger than him. Not a title fight or a top contender fight, or even a fight with any clear stakes beyond the fact that it would be much better to win than to lose.
Song has made it clear what he thinks will happen as a result of Saturday’s fight.
“I believe I will make him retire off this one,” Song told Uncrowned’s “The Ariel Helwani Show” earlier this week. “It’s going to be once I beat [him] up.”
Cejudo laughed off that statement, of course.
“I think he’s a lunatic,” he said. “That’s what I think about that statement. I think I’m going to retire him. I’m going to beat him up and send him back to China. How about that?”
And sure, that’s the Cejudo we’re used to. Deep down he’s still the same guy who used to bring props to press conferences to facilitate his pre-fight trash talk. This is the part of the game that doesn’t get any harder with age.
But what if the BetMGM oddsmakers (who currently have Cejudo as a 2-to-1 underdog) prove to be right? What if the young fighter full of firepower proves to be too much for him? Then he’s 0-3 since his return, miles away from a title shot and dangerously close to 40. If a second retirement isn’t at least a consideration then, maybe it ought to be.
With all that on the line, it’s hard not to wonder about motivation. Song isn’t exactly a young fighter with nothing to lose, but he does seem to have more to gain from this one fight than Cejudo does. One thing you don’t hear Song talking about is his duplexes and apartment buildings.
Cejudo? He’s an accomplished gentleman of a certain age. He has other options and other considerations.
Upon leaving the MMA world due to falling out of love with the sport, his return has not been met with the same fervor and passion he once had.
Despite his skills and experience, there is a lingering doubt as to whether they will be enough to carry him through upcoming fights. If they fail, even Cejudo himself may question his decision to return to the sport.