Hunt: I got caught with my hand in Werdum’s cookie jar

UFC heavyweight Mark Hunt can be playful and goofy and fun, and he can break the jaw of any man on the planet. Late last year he got the call of a lifetime – a shot at the UFC heavyweight championship, the baddest man on the planet.

Bad news was he had to drop 40+ pounds, and get in shape to fight five rounds, at 7,350 feet, in three weeks, at the age of 40. He took the fight and started the grind, and then suffered an unnamed issue in his home life.

In the first round, Hunt dropped Werdum, and rather than pouncing, called him back up into Hunt world. In the second round, Hunt dropped Werdum again, but the cut and the elevation and opponent all got to him, and he was stopped at 2:27 of the second.

Hunt appeared recently on Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour, and looked forward and back. Hunt is looking forward to headlining UFC Fight Night 65 vs. Stipe Miocic.

“Yes, I like any fight,” said Hunt as transcribed by Luke Thomas for MMAFighting.com. “Stipe’s above me, so it’s great. It’s good news

“Someone above me would’ve been great, so that’s exactly what I wanted. Someone higher than me in the rankings, but of course, I think I’m #1, anyways.”

Hunt also looked back, at the Werdum fight.

“I got caught,” he said simply. “I made a mistake and got caught. I was trying to steal cookies out of his jar. It ended up a highlight reel, so you can’t make those mistakes.”

“No, I haven’t it. I don’t really like to watch replays of… it depends. I just didn’t watch it. That’s all.”

“I do watch some of my losses, but it just makes me think, ‘Well, you know, should have done this; could have done that.’ But that’s why I don’t like watching it. It’s a shoulda/coulda/woulda thing. You go back in the moment there and you’re like, ‘Wow. That’s where you made the mistake.’ So that’s what happens.”

Hunt did not try to hide the difficult of the cut, and again alluded to the personal issues, which appropriately keeping them personal. He also said by fight time they had worked out.

“Yeah, it was pretty exhausting,” he said. “It was one of the those things, I don’t realize it when I fight that quickly. It’s what happens. I lost the fight. That’s what happens.”

“That was pretty hectic. it wasn’t actually all that. That was hard, but I had other issues that were even more draining than that. But that was pretty hard, yeah.

“I had issues that came up. It wasn’t good. … just mentioning it wore me down. I was broken at that time. It wasn’t good.”

“It was just domestic stuff. It had nothing to do with the fight. It had nothing to do with the fight at all. It was other issues, it was personal issues.”

“I can’t use anything as an excuse. I got caught trying to steal Werdum’s freakin’ cookie jar. I got caught. I made a mistake and got caught and got knocked out, and that’s what happens.”