Ricardo
Lamas was
contemplating the end of his career following his victory
against Bill Algeo at
UFC Fight Night 175, and now that decision is official.
The 38-year-old Chicago native official announced his retirement to
MMA Junkie Radio on Monday. Lamas revealed that he finalized
his decision as a tribute to his late brother, who died on Aug. 28,
2009 – nearly 11 years to the day of his last bout.
Lamas told
MMAFighting.com that he’d been considering calling it a career
as far back as 2017 following a first-round TKO of Jason
Knight at UFC 214. More recently, “The Bully” suffered a broken
jaw in a setback to Calvin
Kattar at UFC 238, and that forced Lamas to revisit those
thoughts of exiting a sport he’d competed in professionally since
2008.
Barring a change of heart down the road, Lamas was able to end his
fighting career on a high note with the win over Algeo.
“[I want to be remembered] that I always left it in the cage,”
Lamas told MMAFighting. “Just like in this fight, it was a
back-and-forth fight. But just never stopping, and kind of as
fights progress on, I just get meaner and the dog comes out of me a
little more. That’s probably due to me being the youngest of six
boys and just getting beaten up to a point where I just started
fighting back.
“I want to be remembered for someone that always gave it their all.
I never went in there and bulls—-ed, I never went in there and
disrespected people. I just went in to perform.”
Lamas’ triumph over Algeo gave him 11 UFC triumphs in 17
promotional appearances, tying him for the third most wins in the
history of the division. It’s a run that included a loss to
Jose
Aldo in a title fight in 2014 along with victories over the
likes of Cub Swanson,
Hatsu
Hioki, Dennis
Bermudez, Diego
Sanchez, Charles
Oliveira and Darren
Elkins.