Josh Hokit has said his piece. Yahoo Sports reported Sunday that the heavyweight released a statement following his loss to Ciryl Gane in the UFC 334 main event, his first public words since coming up short in the title fight. I haven’t seen the full text, and I’m not going to put words in the mouth of a man who just spent a night getting hit by a former Muay Thai champion. So here’s what the record shows.
The loss drops Hokit to 10-1. Knockout Daily’s rankings had him at No. 10 at heavyweight going in, and Wikipedia listed him No. 5 in the Meta UFC heavyweight rankings as of Oct. 24. Gane, now 15-2, is the UFC heavyweight champion, the first Frenchman to hold a UFC title, and sits No. 11 pound-for-pound.
Hokit didn’t get to the cage the easy way. He played tight end and fullback at Fresno State while wrestling his way to All-American honors, then bounced around the San Francisco 49ers practice squad and was cut by the Arizona Cardinals after five days in 2022. His pro MMA debut came at Bellator 300 in October 2023. Three years later he was headlining against the champ, two days after his 29th birthday.
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The fight itself drew sympathy online. The MMA Guru wrote on X that Hokit got an “Eye poked badly in the first minute of his big title fight with everything on the line” and claimed the referee let it continue with no break and no point taken. That’s one observer’s account, and no other source here confirms the referee’s handling. The same post praised Hokit for marching forward against a much bigger man.
Then came the cosign that’ll get passed around Hokit’s gym for months. Happy Punch posted video of Alex Pereira telling Hokit he thought he’d won. Hokit’s reply: “Chama.”
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Fight week was pure chaos, which is how Hokit apparently likes it. He played drunk on the scale at weigh-ins and lay still for more than a minute, per Championship Rounds. Amanda Nunes was caught laughing at one of his press conference lines. And during introductions, Happy Punch reported, he flipped off Bruce Buffer, who had previously criticized his antics.
No next booking has been announced. My take, for whatever my betting record is worth (not much, ask my accountant): the act sells tickets, but the wrestling and the willingness to walk through a champion’s offense are what win fights. The next time some bookmaker hangs Hokit as a fat underdog against a top-five heavyweight because he passed out on a scale, I’m reading the scorecards from UFC 334 first.
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