Back in March of this year, a kickboxing event was held in Zagreb, Croatia. It was called “Final Fight: Cro Cop vs Sefo” which was supposed to make you believe that Mirko Cro Cop was retiring. Pat yourself on the back if you saw right through the obvious troll job. Croatians aren’t great at tricking people. In fact, only Mauro Ranallo falls for their pranks. The truth is, CroCop will never retire until he feels like it. Your criticism and doubt doesn’t factor into his decision making process. In most sports, you’d admire that kind of determination, but in combat sports, we react differently for various reasons. Here’s what Mirko had to say about it.
“If you ask me, when I look deep into my soul, of course I would like to fight MMA again,” Filipovic said. “People don’t get it. Martial arts is my life.””My motivation now is to prove to everyone that I’m still capable of being in the cage. I’m not old. I’m 37, but I can do things that fighters 10 years younger cannot. I will prove that, or I will die trying.”
Since we can’t stop CroCop from fighting, we can only hope that he doesn’t get hurt in the interest of whatever is left of Gary LaPlante’s sanity. Even if CroCop gets hurt, he seems OK with it. I’d end this paragraph with my opinion, but it’s completely irrelevant because CroCop doesn’t care. In all likelihood, I’ll continue to watch him fight regardless of how relevant the contest is in the grand scheme of things. So will you, stop trying to tell everyone in the room you won’t. They probably don’t follow MMA and you’re only lying to yourself. [Source]
Banner art via Antonio Nikoloski
