Patricio Pitbull lost a highly anticipated featherweight clash with Aaron Pico at UFC 327, and he will need medical attention after post-fight exams detected multiple fractures to his face.
The former two-division Bellator champion reveled Wednesday on social media that he fractured his right orbital bone and the right side of his nose in the opening round, and that directly affected his ability to impose his game plan against Pico.
“Congrats to my opponent, he was well-trained and really fast,” Pitbull said. “Some people in the media were saying that I was doing well in the first round by my performance dropped off sharply from the first to the second round. It turns out that I took a clean shot right in the eye, with my eye wide open. A sequence of a jab and a straight right, and it ended up fracturing my orbital bone right here and this side of my nose.”
“That compromised my vision right at the start of the second round, so all I could do was try to protect myself from the blows that were coming,” he continued. “Of course, I tried to attack too, by with very little success. I was hit with a barrage of strikes throughout the entire second round. And anyone who saw it could tell that this old man still has a bit of a chin here, that I can take a few hits. Unfortunately, that was all I could manage, given the condition I was in.”
Pitbull is expected to run more tests in “two or three weeks” to determine whether or not he will require surgery, his team told MMA Fighting on Wednesday. For now, it appears that he will avoid surgery.
Pitbull made sure to praise Pico for the win and say that revealing such injuries is not an attempt to “make excuses” for the loss.
“The fact that I lost my vision during the fight was entirely my opponent’s doing since it resulted from a strike,” Pitbull said. “So, congratulations Aaron Pico, but I’ll be back soon.”
The Brazilian veteran is now 1-2 since joining the UFC, a win over Dan Ige in between defeats to Yair Rodriguez and Pico, and feels with his heart “broken.” Pitbull, however, won’t give up his dream of adding a UFC belt to his collection.
“I’m aware of what I can still do in this weight class,” Pitbull said. “But I’m also aware that, after taking a few steps back, I need to take a longer path. And I won’t talk about the title for now. I need to fight a few more times and get myself back into that position. I’m ready. My heart is broken, nobody likes to lose, last of all me. It was a fight I felt very confident about. I was sure I was going to win. But that’s how fighting is, you’re always at risk of being defeated. It’s no different for me.”
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