Former UFC Bantamweight Champion TJ Dillashaw Announces his Retirement from MMA

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August 4, 2018; Los Angeles, CA, USA; TJ Dillashaw celebrates his championship victory against Cody Garbrandt during UFC 227 at Staples Center. Mandatory Credit: Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports

Former two-time UFC Bantamweight Champion TJ Dillashaw has retired from the sport of MMA, his agent Tiki Ghosn confirmed to ESPN.

Dillashaw was last seen in the octagon in October in UFC 280 where he lost to Aljamain Sterling in the co-main event of the card to try and regain his bantamweight strap where he infamously dislocated his shoulder early in a very uncompetitive fight. This fight was coming off a 16-month layoff from his previous win against Cody Sandhagen.

Most would like to think Dillashaw’s legacy lies somewhere in between the biggest title-fight underdog win against the dominant Renan Barão to win the belt for the first time, to him repeating the dominance in the rematch, to his feud against Cody Garbrandt where he knocked his former teammate out twice to regain and defend his belt — but unfortunately that won’t be the case.

Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports

Like millions of blood-fueled elephants, MMA fans never forget. After his failed double-champ attempt in 2019, Dillashaw was stripped of his remaining title due to testing positive for EPO. He was given a two-year suspension, and only had those Sandhagen and Sterling fights where he went 1-1 in the last three years.

In this sport, nothing is final, especially not retirement. It takes a rare breed to walk away from this sport at (or near) the top of their powers, and despite the loss to Sterling, nothing indicates Dillawshaw has had a very steep decline in performance. This is where the speculation of doubt kicks in.

Unless it’s an obviously older fighter who’s on a big losing streak, every time a fighter announces their retirement from the sport, most fans give it a nice eye roll and tell themselves “yeah, I’ll see them back in the octagon in a year.” Such is the case for Dillashaw. With his history of PED use, many believe he’s going the Conor McGregor route (ALLEGEDLY), where he retires to exit the USADA testing pool so he can take a substance on the banned list to recover quicker.

Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Many would sneer at the idea of a fighter using any PED’s but there’s a fine line of substances that help you recover versus ones that are performance enhancing. If Dillashaw isn’t done with the sport, and is using this as an excuse to speed up his recovery, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. The former two-time champion is a soon-to-be 37-year old fighter with some major mileage who just suffered a major injury in the sport. His body isn’t going to recover like a lot of the young guys.

Dillashaw retires (for now) from the sport with a 17-5 record, and a consensus top-5 bantamweight of all time.

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