Dominick Cruz: Mackenzie Dern Was ‘Basically Cheating’ By Coming in So Far Over Weight
Mackenzie Dern put on arguably the best performance of her career on Saturday night at UFC 224, but it seems like she’s facing far more criticism than praise in the aftermath.
The problem with Dern’s win stems largely from her missing weight by a whopping seven pounds on Friday before then knocking down and choking out Amanda Cooper 24 hours later in Brazil.
Dern has struggled with her weight cut in the past as she’s failed to hit the strawweight limit as many times as she’s actually made it.
That’s why former UFC bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz can’t be certain that Dern even tried to make weight so she’d have a massive size advantage when stepping into the cage with Cooper on Saturday night.
“That weight is a huge advantage,” Cruz said on the UFC 224 post fight show. “There’s a reason, ladies and gentlemen, why we have weight classes. When you’re seven pounds over a weight class, that is not trying to make weight. That is creating yourself an advantage to win. Because in the end, how sad was Dern about the weight loss or being too heavy? She was just happy to have the win.
“That’s the point of this sport to win and when you come in with that big of a weight advantage, being a 45’er to a 35’er, being a 35’er to a 25’er, being a 85’er to a 70 pounder, that’s an advantage. That’s a huge advantage and it’s basically cheating in my opinion.”
Dern was fined 30-percent of her show purse for the weight cutting in fraction, but she still ultimately got the win, which is what is most important.
"When you come in with that big of a weight advantage… it's basically cheating in my opinion." – Dominick Cruz on Mackenzie Dern. pic.twitter.com/sONQ5Qs4lt
— FOX Sports: UFC (@UFCONFOX) May 13, 2018
Dern detailed her huge weight cutting miss after the show while explaining that she missed a flight to Brazil and felt like she had her diet in line coming off her last win at UFC 222 in March. Obviously that wasn’t the case and Dern was massively over the limit for her fight.
Now Dern will look to work with the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas in an attempt to get her weight in check so she can attempt another strawweight fight with the UFC later this year.
