One of the most revealing moments in the career of any blue-chip prospect is often the first brush with adversity. Winning is easy, but only through hardship does the purview of reflection clearly enter the picture, when the embarrassment of a night gone wrong tramples upon a self-image that may have stood so strong just hours before.
And for Darrion Caldwell, that moment of clarity came this past summer.
Caldwell suffered the first professional setback of his mixed martial arts career in July when he tapped to a third-round guillotine at the hands of little-known Joe Taimanglo at Bellator 159.