Ali Abdelaziz recently gave his take on Zabit Magomedsharipov's retirement, where he indicated that Magomedsharipov would not be returning to the octagon.
Magomedsharipov announced his retirement from combat sports during seemingly his peak in 2022, shocking the entire MMA community. The Dagestani fighter called off his professional career due to a lack of competition and multiple health difficulties.
Although Abdelaziz hinted at Magomedsharipov’s comeback last month in his X post, the MMA manager has now completely dismissed reports of the 34-year-old’s return. During a recent appearance on the Pound 4 Pound podcast, Abdelaziz blamed himself and the UFC for keeping Magomedsharipov away from the octagon for a long time. He also addressed the failed matchups with Yair Rodriguez, saying:
''No, [Magomedsharipov's] not coming back. Honestly, He got booked 3-4 times against Yair Rodriguez. Yair kept pulling out on him. He just lost love. I am not going to blame anyone from the UFC. I could, but I am not going to do it. I think it was a little bit of the UFC’s fault, and also maybe a little bit of my fault. I should never have made them book him again with Yair Rodriguez. This guy pulled out three, four times, right? In a way, I think Zabit fell off. He has a lot of business, married, kids. He said, ‘I don’t need to do this.'''
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Check out Ali Abdelaziz's comments below:
Notably, a clip showing Magomedsharipov honing his striking skills inside a cage next to Islam Makhachev, who was working on his grappling, went viral among netizens earlier this year.
When Zabit Magomedsharipov explained his decision to retire from MMA
Following an impressive six-fight win streak in the UFC, Zabit Magomedsharipov was expected to face Yair Rodriguez in August 2020. However, their fight didn't materialize after the Mexican suffered an ankle injury.
Two years later Magomedsharipov announced his retirement and expressed his frustration with the MMA organization in a past interview with Fighting Flashback:
''The reasons...there were many reasons. Firstly because of refusals to fight with me. I had no fights for two years. Then there were injuries, I was sick a lot. I didn’t recover. Such, many reasons. The main reason was that I was not able to fight. They didn’t give me a title shot. They promised one thing and did another. That was a little bit ... they promised me and didn’t keep a promise. That was the main reason why I got mad.” [H/t: MMA Mania]