Adrian Yanez is standing firmly behind the legitimacy of his UFC 329 victory after stopping Cody Garbrandt by first-round TKO on the prelims at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Garbrandt, a former UFC bantamweight champion, removed his gloves in the octagon after the loss, prompting questions about his future, though he later posted a statement indicating he is not done fighting.
Yanez pushed back on criticism of the matchup and of Garbrandt’s recent form. “I can kind of see and understand where people are getting that from, but like, come on, dude. He hasn't gotten knocked out in a while and it's been a while, and he's only lost to very, very good fighters. He hasn't lost to any bums or anything like that. Raoni Barcelos, Deiveson Figueiredo, Kai Kara-France, all those guys, they're legit. Pedro Munoz was in the top 15 for such a long time.”
“So, this whole narrative of like, 'Oh man, he's washed' ... No, he's only lost to the best guys, and then you give him somebody like (Xiao) Long, and he goes out there and he wins,” Yanez added, later calling fans “fickle” and saying, “I hate those type of narratives.”
Yanez admitted he had mixed emotions seeing Garbrandt’s gloves come off. “I was like, man, like, I don't know how I feel about that. That's weird. Like being somebody's last fight would be a little bit weird, especially someone like Cody Garbrandt. The time that he goes out, he deserves the video package and everything... he deserves the shine as soon as he decides to call it a career.”
