Cody Garbrandt sure seemed like the future of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Bantamweight division, scoring three highlight-reel finishes over top-ranked contenders to earn a 135-pound title shot opposite Dominick Cruz in Dec. 2016. He then made the most of the opportunity, outclassing one of the most technical strikers in mixed martial arts (MMA) en route to a dominant unanimous decision victory.
His reign didn’t last long, though. Indeed, “No Love” ran into a T.J. Dillashaw right hook counter from hell that resulted in a second round knockout loss. Then, just nine months later, the former training partners-turned bitter rivals ran it back at UFC 227 and Garbrandt suffered another devastating loss.
That’s a tough pill to swallow, especially after talking so much trash ... and releasing old training footage just two days before their initial showdown. So it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that the confident and charismatic Garbrandt has been laying low since his latest loss last month.
“Cody is enjoying being a family man right now,” according to his mentor and Team Alpha Male (TAM) training partner, Urijah Faber (via MMAFighting.com). “He was in the gym the other day and he was in good spirits. I know he’s been working out still.”
Garbrandt, 27, became a father earlier this year. He was married late last year and actually has a tattoo of his wife on his arm (see it). In other words, Garbrandt is a proud family man who currently prefers to focus on them rather than being active on social media and getting roasted by Internet trolls.
“This is a mean world, and everyone likes to jump in and kick people when they’re down,” Faber continued. “Cody is someone who wears his heart on his sleeve, there’s no pretenses with him. I don’t know if that has something to do with it, if it was negativity he was paying attention to.”
There is currently no timetable for Garbrandt’s return to the Octagon. He is still ranked as the No. 1-ranked contender in the division despite the back-to-back losses to Dillashaw, which would seemingly indicate that he has a lot more left in the tank once he decides to step out of the shadows.
Even though rivals like “Viper” would claim otherwise.
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