According to Kamaru Usman’s manager, the 39-year-old isn’t quite ready to hang up the gloves and call it a day.
This past July, Kamaru Usman returned to action for the first time in over a year when he took on Dricus Du Plessis in the UFC Oklahoma City main event.
Unfortunately for the former welterweight champion, he was dominated for five rounds by the former middleweight king, losing for the fourth time in five fights.
Not long after the fight, ‘The Nigerian Nightmare’ came out and revealed that he fought the fight with a torn pectoral, revealing that he was thinking twice about retiring from the sport.
Usman’s manager says he won’t retire but may move back down to 170lbs
After his loss, Usman remained adamant that he was going to continue his career and continue chasing big fights.
But after finding out about the extent of his injury, the 39-year-old stated that he was going to reconsider his stance on that.
However, now a few weeks removed from his disappointing performance, his manager Ali Abdelaziz has provided an update regarding Usman’s future in the sport.
“Kamaru Usman is not gonna retire,” Abdelaziz told MMAJunkie.
“He’s been fighting the best guys in the world… He’s not losing, nobody is whipping Kamaru’s a–, he’s always in the fight. I was always against him going to middleweight because I think he’s too small.
“If he decides to stay, I would like him to go back to welterweight because there are a lot of right opponents for him at welterweight. He was the right opponent for Islam (Makhachev), he was Islam’s toughest fight,” he continued.
After winning the 170lb title, Islam Makhachev highlighted Usman as his preferred first title defense, despite his recent losing streak.
That was of course rejected by the UFC who opted to go with Ian Machado Garry instead of the former welterweight champion.
Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC
“He hung with a guy that was 20lbs heavier than him on fight day, and I’m not taking anything away from Du Plessis… Kamaru Usman is a future Hall of Famer and the greatest welterweight fighter of all time,” Abdelaziz added.
If recent rumors are to be believed, Usman is in talks for a bizarre crossover to boxing, with negotiations ongoing for a potential boxing fight against Chris Eubank Jr. in Nigeria.
2026-08-05 18:00:00
