Pellegrino not retiring, wants ‘big’ UFC fight in Dec.
“I’m so sorry I lost the fight – to all my fans – but I don’t want to go out…
“I’m so sorry I lost the fight – to all my fans – but I don’t want to go out that way,” Pellegrino today told MMAjunkie.com).
“I want to fight in December. If I can fight in December, that will give me enough time to go through the surgery, to heal my leg and get ready to fight.”
“If you watch the fight, he knocks me down. As he jumps on top of me, he pushed me over my leg, and you can see me holding my left knee as he was punching me in the face.
“I have no idea how I was able to fight through that – just by the grace of God and the will to where I tell people I’ll never tap. I think it was just that will that kept me going.”
“I was completely healed from my injury; the doctors all cleared me, and I was ready to go. That’s why I fought. George completely, 100 percent won the fight. If I didn’t get knocked down, I wouldn’t have re-tore my meniscus. But I got knocked down, so that was a credit to George and a discredit to me.”
“I will not keep my head down for too long. I used that retirement for motivation, but there’s still huge fights for me in the UFC. I’m looking to have a big fight, win the big fight, and get right back into the title picture.”
“Kenny (Florian) is one of my heroes, and when he lost for the title against B.J., he went and fought Gomi in his next fight. That put him right back into it. I would like to follow the same footsteps as my mentor.”