After nearly two decades of dominance in the MMA world, Jose Aldo has finally bid farewell to the sport. At UFC 315, ‘The King of Rio’ stepped into the Octagon one last time, facing Aiemann Zahabi in a hard-fought battle. Despite a valiant effort, Aldo fell short via unanimous decision, just his second loss since making a comeback last year. As the final bell rang and the reality of defeat sank in, Aldo made the emotional decision to lay down his gloves for good. Amid the chaos and tributes, Alex Pereira’s former girlfriend sent a heartfelt message to the legendary former featherweight champion.
Merle took to her Instagram handle to share a photo of her with Jose Aldo on her story and captioned it with a special message, “Forever a legend. Enjoy your retirement, champ. Thanks for everything you did in this sport.” Despite his age, Aldo went toe-to-toe with Zahabi. However, the final round proved to be monumental, as both fighters were exhausted, and Zahabi capitalized on the situation to further drain Aldo’s remaining energy.
After the announcement, Adlo took to his Instagram handle to state, “This may have been my last time inside the Octagon. This week, I faced one of the biggest battles of my life, and it wasn’t against an opponent, but within myself. Over the past few years, I rekindled the dream of becoming a champion once again. I trained as I always did, gave.”
With a career record of 32 victories and only 10 defeats, his journey didn’t end the way he envisioned—but who cares? He is a two-time featherweight champion and arguably the greatest featherweight to have ever stepped into the UFC. His resume speaks volumes, and everyone knows that Aldo has never turned down a fight. Whether it was top contenders in the featherweight division like Alexander Volkanovski and Max Holloway, or elite names from the bantamweight division like Petr Yan and Merab Dvalishvili, he faced them all without backing down.
With the heart of a champion, ‘The King of Rio’ left behind a legacy that will seldom be replicated. Interestingly, his last two fights—both losses—were also marred by controversy. His battle with Zahabi was controversial, as many believe that the judges favoured Aldo’s opponent. Let’s have a look at what featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski had to say about this.
Alexander Volkanovski calls out the judges after Jose Aldo’s defeat
Jose Aldo lost all three rounds on all three judges’ scorecards — this, despite dropping Zahabi twice with a thunderous knee and a vicious head kick that had the crowd roaring. When the judges released he scorecards, the entire MMA community came in unison to call them out for their bias. Amidst this chaos, featherweight champion and Aldo’s former opponent, Alexander Volkanovski, has come forward to rip apart the judges.
“I wanna talk about the Aldo fight, obviously, reasonably fair, I get it, but when you talk about damage, I know he ended up very tired on the bottom in that third round,” Volkanovski began to explain in a video on his YouTube channel. “Aldo won round one, but they gave the other two to his opponent. The second one, again, is very close… I wanna talk about the third round. It was clear Aldo pretty much the whole way through that round.”
He further added, “In the middle of it, he hurt his opponent, and when we talk damage, it doesn’t get any more damaging than that. He rocked him, dropped him, then dropped him (again) with a crazy kick, proper soccer kick to the head… His opponent dominated the last bit, but is that enough when you’re losing most of the round and you got proper beat up, it was that close to being finished.”
For Alexander Volkanovski, Jose Aldo is the rightful winner of their close battle. Judging in the promotion has long been a problematic issue, but it now seems to be spiraling out of control. Given that, what are your thoughts on Jose Aldo’s career? State your opinion in the comments below.
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