UFC Hall of Famer Daniel Cormier has responded to Joaquin Buckley’s recent invitation for a face-to-face conversation after their hostile online back-and-forths.
Cormier and Buckley’s relationship soured after Buckley’s callout of Conor McGregor at UFC Louisville in May. Cormier called the decision to call out McGregor the “worst callout in UFC history”, to which Buckley didn’t respond in kind.
Buckley responded with several personal attacks against Cormier, including his invoking of Cormier’s late mother into his taunts.
After their heat-filled social media squabbles, Buckley appears ready to bury the hatchet with Cormier ahead of his upcoming fight.
Daniel Cormier on Joaquin Buckley: “My job isn’t to uplift you”
During a recent video uploaded to his YouTube channel, Cormier answered Buckley’s calls to meet face-to-face.
“Yesterday, and I don’t really like to do this, because I shouldn’t have to,” Cormier said. “Joaquin Buckley was speaking about our interaction on social media, and how he wishes to run into me one day. We’re going to see each other in Salt Lake City, it is what it is, and then we can talk like men. That’s how I do it, that’s how I deal with all of these types of situations whenever people start coming at me in this way…
“At the end of the day, I am who I am. I’m Daniel Cormier and ‘Imma be who ‘I’mma be. So it’s a matter of how does the interaction start? Because online, it’s been very disrespectful. Now? He seems to be peeling it back a little bit, and I believe that’s the right decision…I’m not trying to do anything to this man when he’s on the verge of one of the biggest fights of his career,” Cormier continued. “I don’t get though…my job isn’t to uplift you, my job is to tell the truth! And I just didn’t agree with what you said in that callout. It was bad, it was really bad…Many people were in agreement that it wasn’t good. But that’s okay, we all make mistakes…we all have bad ones. Unfortunately, yours was at the biggest moment of your career. But again, I’ll be in Salt Lake City, I’ll be there and we can have that conversation that you want to have, Joaquin Buckley.”
Buckley faces former UFC title challenger Stephen Thompson at UFC 307. Cormier will be on the call cage-side alongside Joe Rogan and lead play-by-play Jon Anik.