Henry Cejudo has built a second career out of saying the quiet part straight into a podcast mic, and this week the quiet part was about Alex Pereira. On “Pound 4 Pound,” the show he co-hosts with Kamaru Usman, Cejudo listened to Poatan’s complaints about the Ciryl Gane loss and handed him a deli ticket.
“It’s part of him being a bit spoiled,” Cejudo said, in comments picked up by MMA Junkie.
I’m with Henry on this one. I don’t say that often, because the man once dressed up like a deity on purpose, but he’s right, and the case basically makes itself.
Quick recap of the grievances. Pereira lost by TKO to Gane at UFC Freedom 250 in June and has argued that referee Herb Dean let a bunch of shots to the back of his head slide. Then the UFC tapped Josh Hokit for Gane’s first title defense at UFC 334 on Nov. 14, and Pereira took that personally too. Two complaints, one theme. He thinks he’s owed the rematch.
The fouls were real. So was the jab.
Credit to Cejudo for not pretending the illegal shots didn’t happen. He gave Pereira that much right away.
“Yeah, there were illegal blows, I do agree with you on that. But that jab from Ciryl Gane wobbled you.”
That’s the most honest sentence anyone has said about this fight. A rematch argument built on referee error is strongest when the guy getting fouled was clearly on his way to winning. Cejudo’s read is that Gane was keeping it standing and the direction of the fight was already visible before the finish. He followed it with a shrug that every fan has heard from a cornerman at 1 a.m.: “It is what it is.”
You can believe Dean blew it and still believe Pereira was losing. Both things live in the same fight. And losing a fight that ended dirty earns you sympathy. It doesn’t earn you a belt.
The White House was the express lane
And this is where Pereira’s complaint falls apart for me. He had zero heavyweight fights on his resume and walked straight into an interim title fight at the White House. His heavyweight debut was a title fight on the most absurd, most televised stage the UFC has ever built. Cejudo spelled it out:
“To be upset after not having a fight at heavyweight and then getting a shot to fight for the interim title at the White House, there’s no complaining here.”
Think about that from the perspective of every heavyweight who has been grinding through prelims and Fight Night co-mains hoping somebody in the matchmaking office remembers his name. Pereira got called up from Triple-A straight into Game 7 of the World Series. He struck out. Now he wants another at-bat because the ump squeezed the zone. The guys in the dugout who never even got off the bench are allowed to roll their eyes.
“I think there’s a lot of people in line,” Cejudo said, and Josh Hokit getting the Nov. 14 slot is proof the line exists. Somebody else got served. That’s how a line works.
Cejudo also framed it as a pattern rather than a one-off, telling Pereira he isn’t picking on him, he’s just looking at how often Poatan has been waved past everyone else. “You’ve skipped the line long enough,” he said. Harsh? Sure. Inaccurate? Show me where.
Pavlovich is the line, and it’s a real one
The good news for Pereira is that the UFC didn’t send him to the woods. Pereira (13-4 MMA, 10-3 UFC) meets Sergei Pavlovich (20-3 MMA, 9-3 UFC) in a five-round co-main event at UFC 335 on Dec. 12 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. Five rounds against a guy with 20 pro wins is about as legit a heavyweight test as you can schedule. This is the work Cejudo is talking about, and it’s sitting right there on the calendar.
Here’s where I’ll split with Henry a little. He wants Pereira to win “at least two or three more” before another title shot. That feels like a lot. I love a big-money fight, and Pereira-Gane 2 sells itself the second the cage door locks. If Poatan goes out and beats Pavlovich convincingly over five rounds, and the Gane-Hokit result shakes out the right way, I’d be fine with the rematch coming next. One real heavyweight win changes the conversation.
What it shouldn’t take is a podcast tour about Herb Dean. Complaining about the ref and complaining about Hokit’s spot are two ways of asking the UFC for the same favor it already gave him once. The White House fight was the favor. He cashed it.
So the order of operations is simple. Gane and Hokit go first on Nov. 14 at UFC 334. Pereira and Pavlovich go four weeks later on Dec. 12. If Poatan walks out of T-Mobile with his hand raised, he can grab the mic and demand whatever he wants, and I’ll be the first one yelling for it. Until then, Pavlovich is the only argument that counts.
