Daniel Cormier might fight Jon Jones again instead of Brock Lesnar

In an interview with ESPN’s Brett Okamoto, UFC light heavyweight and heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier intimated that his planned fight with former UFC heavyweight champion and WWE star Brock Lesnar might not happen after all.

Cormier has been very vocal about his plans to retire in 2019 before he turns 40. Cormier mentioned that he still plans on fighting just two more times with his short notice heavyweight title defense against Derrick Lewis coming up in November counting one of them. 

If he retains his title on November 3rd at Madison Square Garden, Cormier said he’ll have his choice of Lesnar or the winner of the Jon Jones-Alexander Gustafsson rematch that will close out UFC’s 2018. The Jones-Gustafsson fight will be for the soon-to-be stripped light heavyweight title that Cormier currently holds.

Cormier said that the Jones fight would matter to him more because Jones has beaten him twice and continues to be a rival for him. However, he feels the Lesnar fight would be better for him financially. 

“I think I would always pick the one that means more, but my wife might have something to say about that,” he told Okamoto.

If Gustafsson wins, that opens up the possibility of a rematch of a fight that was one of the best of 2015. However, given what Cormier has said, that seems unlikely.

Cormier told Lange Pugmire of the LA Times that UFC more than doubled what he made for beating Stipe Miocic for the heavyweight title in July, making the decision a lot easier for him to take the fight. He declined to fight Miocic on short notice and preferred Lewis because he feels there’s only one way for Lewis to win: via knockout.