Jose Aldo reflects on knockout loss to Conor McGregor: “I was so confident”

Jose Aldo is arguably the greatest featherweight fighter of all time, but there’s one loss that still hangs over his head: a 2015 KO at the hands of Conor McGregor.

The loss occured at UFC 194 in December of that year. Aldo, then the UFC featherweight champion, had not lost in over a decade, and was considered one of the best fighters alive. Despite his accolades, he was put down by a McGregor left hand in just 13 seconds.

“We never expect to lose — and lose like that,” Aldo said told MMA Fighting, looking back on this famous fight. “It’s a sport and it’s 50-50, of course, it could happen one day. As long as we’re fighting, losing is a possibility, but I was so confident in my head going into this fight. ‘No, I’m super well-prepared, I can’t see how this guy wins.’

“For everything that was said and everything that was going on, my team and I were positive that we would get there and defeat him. And that’s not what happened.”

Aldo went on to say that his loss to McGregor motivated him to train twice as hard and ultimately rebound with an impressive, interim title victory over Frankie Edgar.

“Right after that I said, ‘no, I’m the champion, that was only one fact that will never happen again in my life. That’s why I have to train twice as hard, see the mistakes I made and never make them again,’” Aldo  said.

Since losing to Conor McGregor, Jose Aldo has gone 3-4 against top-flight opposition, defeating Edgar, Jeremy Stephens and Renato Moicano, and losing to Max Holloway (twice), Alex Volkanovski, and Marlon Moraes. That latter loss, a split decision, marked his debut in the bantamweight division, where he was recently expected to battle reigning champ Henry Cejudo for the title.

This article first appeared on BJPENN.com on 4/28/2020.