Tony Ferguson Shuts Down Retirement Talk

Despite his record-tying streak of Octagon futility, Tony Ferguson has no intention of hanging up his gloves.

Ferguson (25-10) suffered a unanimous decision defeat at the hands of Paddy Pimblett on Saturday at UFC 296. It was his seventh straight loss in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, tying B.J. Penn for the longest such streak in the promotion’s history.

In spite of that streak, which includes several lopsided beatdowns and one chilling knockout via front kick, and despite UFC CEO expressing his wish that Ferguson would retire, a defiant “El Cucuy” this week expressed his disinclination to call it quits. The 39-year-old Californian this week wrote an Instagram post that read in part, “Not retiring casuals.”

Prior to his current skid, Ferguson (25-10) was riding the longest winning streak at lightweight and was considered the main threat to former champ Khabib Nurmagomedov back in 2019. However, despite multiple attempts the matchup always fell through. Eventually, Ferguson found himself pitted in an interim title clash against Justin Gaethje at UFC 249 that would change things forever. Gaethje took away Ferguson’s air of invincibility with a brutal beatdown leading to a fifth-round technical knockout that Nurmagomedov predicted would change “El Cucuy” forever. It appears “The Eagle” was right, considering Ferguson has since dropped six more straight. While Ferguson was fighting elite opponents like Charles Oliveira, Beneil Dariush and Michael Chandler at the beginning of this slump, he has been unable to bounce back even against lower-ranked opponents Nate Diaz, Bobby Green and Pimblett.