In my opinion, whenever you get two guys who want to fight each and two guys who want to be in a good fight, you let them fight.
— Daniel Cormier
When I watch Rumble Johnson, he's a bully. He bullies guys. He makes them go backward, and he traps them. I'm not going to allow that. If he tries to bully me, I'll stand right in front of him, and if he hits me, I'll hit him right back. And then we'll see how the bully handles it when nobody is going to run away from him.
When I came into the gym, I wasn't just some guy. I was a two-time Olympian.
I've always had a chip on my shoulder. It kind of drives me. It's something that allows me to train harder, train longer, work better.
Jon Jones, grow up, bud. We're going to fight regardless of how you feel. And when we do, and I'm cutting the line, and you might as well pull the guard because I'm taking you down.
I'm not stuck in Strikeforce. I'm happy to be with them. It's where I started, and they've been great to me.
You don't quit after you get beat. You pick yourself up, and you start rebuilding to accomplish your goals.
Anthony Johnson hits harder than any other person, no doubt. Every time he hit me, it made me kind of, like, fly all over the place. He was trying to take my head off.
People like to call themselves fans of fighting and fans of the sport, but if you're a fan of fighting, how can you not like watching Demetrious Johnson? He's the best at it. He's the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world. Why wouldn't you enjoy watching that guy perform? He does a phenomenal job every time he's in there.
It's like I cannot separate myself from Jon Jones.
A lot of people want to discredit me.
I'm honored to be one of the guys that is seen as a leader of this great team - a team that has stood the test of time. AKA is one of the only teams that has been around since the beginning of the MMA explosion, and it's a huge honor for me to be named captain.
You can love me, you can hate me, but just don't be indifferent. Care about it enough to watch.
Gustafsson is a stud, man. He's a good fighter.
At the end of the day, I'm a man.
It's all matchups, and I knew that I matched up well against 'Rumble' Johnson.
I love Mike Tyson. I was a fan, as everybody else was. The moment somebody stood up to him, he didn't do so well. And that's the same thing with Anthony Johnson. The guy's a bully. He wants to intimidate you; he wants to dominate you. He wants to knock you out. But what happens when you don't knock somebody out? What happens?
I'm not nervous standing with anyone.
People in Toronto love to watch fights.
Just being in the gym every day with someone with goals in common is special.
My training has always been really tough. I've always worked hard. I've always been very committed to my training and focused on my workout.
Reach, and all that other stuff, doesn't play as big a part in MMA as it does in boxing. Guys don't really fight with their length all that much, because they have to worry about the takedown or kicks. They have to worry about so many other things that they can't just fight real tall.
My low center of gravity allows me to defend takedowns a lot better than most people. It's very hard to get to my legs. It's going to be really hard to take me down. There are a lot of positives to being my size.
You've got to be all-in on this sport; you can't be one foot out the door.
You have to be very vocal about being willing to fight anyone.
It's very difficult to make a 100% turnaround. It's tough when you actually do exhibit patterns of bad behavior. You need to have a very strong support system of people who are willing to keep you in your place if you're going to overcome these things.
If you value your wins and you value what you've done over the course of your career, then you wouldn't want people harboring over a loss, even though you fought extremely well.
I've done nothing wrong. Some people just don't like me. Maybe I'm somebody that's easy to dislike, but I don't get it. Whatever. I'll do what I do.
Throughout my entire life, I've always been a captain. I was the captain of my high school team. I was the captain at Oklahoma State University. I was the captain of the 2008 Olympic team.
It is my job to sell these fighters. I'm now a business partner of the UFC. What I do directly affects my paycheck. I try my best. I just don't want people to be indifferent.
I believe that I will represent this sport in the best light possible. I won't mess it up. I won't get myself in any trouble.
I will tell you with 100 percent confidence, Jon Jones is not deep in my head. The fact he actually thinks that, it makes me smile every day.
A lot of times, losing a fight is tough. In your darkest hours, I guess your true colors show.
I think that Amanda Nunes and Julianna Pena and Valentina Shevchenko... they've showed how much this level has gone up in female fighting in a very short period of time.
My daughter passed away in 2003.
Food doesn't necessarily have to suck in order to be healthy. It doesn't have to be terrible to be healthy anymore.
There are ways to win fights, and sometimes you don't always choose the easiest way to win a fight.
When you start fighting, when your dream is to be the champion of the world, when you accomplish that, you don't feel lost. It doesn't hinder you. It only helps.
I'm confident in my team. I'm confident in my coaches. I'm confident in my ability. I worked really hard to become a better mixed martial artist.
I think after I beat Ryan Bader, he should have to go get beat up by Anthony Johnson for being so disrespectful to Anthony Johnson.
Dan Henderson, even when you're close and he hits you from very, very close, you can feel how heavy his hands are. His hands are pretty powerful.
We've seen smaller guys in main event fights, and they do well. It just takes the right combination of people I think. I think Dominick Cruz v. T.J. Dillashaw could have main-evented a PPV and done pretty good.
Cain's an animal, man. Cain's a competitor. I want to spar with Cain because I know if I'm able to hang with him here in the gym, once I get out there in the cage and fight, I mean, I've already gone toe-to-toe with Cain Velasquez, you know?
Some people just don't like you; you cannot satisfy everyone. But I've got a lot of supportive fans - people who do like me, do enjoy what I do.
I've done nothing but show up and fight, go to work inside the Octagon, outside the Octagon, and do things right. But people want to talk about me and discredit me.
I don't mind Ryan Bader thinking he deserves a title shot.
When I said I could beat Alexander Gustafsson in a standup fight, people laughed at me. They thought, 'No way.' But I believe in what I'm seeing every day.
I'm gonna live my life the correct way, and I'm gonna be a champion the kids look up to and hopefully aspire to be like.
I'm letting competition drive me, and when competition drives me, I don't think anyone can compete with me.
Fvery time Anthony and I are supposed to fight, the lines come out, and it's like we're dead even. It's like people don't know what to make of a fight between Daniel Cormier and Anthony Johnson, when in reality, it should be very easy to know what to make of a fight between me and Anthony Johnson.
