by Cub Swanson is truly one of a kind.
The Californian “Killer Cub’s” 44-fight career was full of thrills and unforgettable moments. Swanson delivered another wild Fight of the Night against Billy Quarantillo last Saturday at UFC Tampa. Despite his veteran status and his experienced age, the 41-year-old Swanson performed as usual and beat Quarantillo in round 3.
Although he hasn’t made an official decision yet, this performance could be the WEC OG’s swansong.
“I’m very happy with where I’m at right now,” Swanson said on “The Ariel Helwani Show.” We’ll see if something excites me, but overall the way I feel right now I’m pretty happy and think I can do it now.
“Everyone wants me to say what it is [about retirement]and that’s just not it. I really need to think about it because I don’t want to be a guy who doesn’t retire and retire. It’s just not fair to everyone around me. It’s not fair to anyone, so I want to make sure I take the time and make the right decisions. I still need to get my hand checked, I still need to get my eyes checked a little bit, so there’s just things I need to do.
“If there’s a fight that I’m really excited about, maybe that really motivates me, but right now I just can’t imagine fighting again,” he concluded.
Swanson has accomplished as much as a fighter could hope for without fighting for a world title. From the first days he fought in the WEC’s famous blue cage, Swanson competed and competed against MMA legends like Jose Aldo and Jens Pulver.
Although the perennial featherweight contender never had the opportunity to fight for the big time, he has no regrets about how he handled an entertaining career.
“When I first started the sport, I was annoyed that I never knew it existed, and in 2003 I started and thought, ‘How come I’ve never heard of it?'” Swanson recalls. “So I started going back and watching the first UFCs and looking at the history of jiu-jitsu, how it started, and just martial arts in general. And I got to know all the old things. I knew about all of these things, like the history of MMA, I feel like I’ve lived through a good portion of it by now, and when people are like, “Who is this guy?” Oh, you don’t know who It is? What are you doing?
“It irritates me because I feel like it’s important to know the history and understand where it comes from and just see the evolution of the sport. It was wild to be there, it was wild to watch. I encourage people to be kind.” to go back and learn.
Few fighters achieve Hall of Famer status before their careers are over. Thanks to his instant classic showdown with South Korean Doo Ho Choi at UFC 206 in 2016, Swanson joined that special status. The fight was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame fight wing in 2022.
Looking back through Swanson’s catalog of certified banger brawls, it’s easy to single out this win over Choi as highlight No. 1. However, a recent performance against a veteran also stands out for the knockout artist.
“If they only saw one fight, I would say it’s a great one,” Swanson said of his Choi win. “I [also] I really liked the finish I got [Darren] Elkins [from 2021] because I was playing around with a few things that involved standing upright and changing postures.”
Aside from a recent cameo at bantamweight in 2022, the featherweight division has been Swanson’s home since 2006. The last three fights at bantamweight have been a return to form for Swanson, as he has won two of those three.
A unanimous decision win over Canada’s Hakeem Dawodu kicked off that stretch before Swanson lost a hard-fought split decision to Andre Fili at UFC 303 last June. The MMA community largely felt that Swanson should have had his hand raised in this case.
However, as it turns out, Swanson fans were lucky that the result was what it was. Had the longtime veteran been rewarded with the nod, he might not have put on a show last Saturday in Tampa.
“If I had won the Fili fight, I probably would have put my gloves down right there,” Swanson said. “But that didn’t happen, and that kind of messed me up, you know? I felt empty. It was a strange feeling. I was pissed and I had to think about it again and I was like, ‘Okay, I’ll jump right back into it.’ So that’s what happened.
“I woke up that morning and was like, ‘Man, this is International Fight Week, I’m on the main card, it’s going to be huge. What a night.’ If I come out there and put on a show then maybe I’ll say it, if I get beat up then I probably shouldn’t go out there, I have a great fight then everyone’s like, “Man.” “I thought you won .’”
