Mauricio “Shogun” Rua was hoping for a shot at the UFC light heavyweight belt with a win at UFC Hamburg, especially after Daniel Cormier named him as the ideal next contender, but his dreams fell apart at the hands of Anthony Smith.
Rua’s three-fight winning streak was snapped by Smith in the opening round of their main event bout on July 22, handing him his first loss since Nov. 2014. In his first interview since the defeat, Rua opened up about what went wrong in the Octagon.
“Everything went right up until the end of the fight,” Rua told MMA Fighting.