“I remember being, I don’t know, maybe 10, 11, 12 years old, seeing Cain Velasquez fight Brock Lesnar. Cain’s a Yuma boy, similar background, similar family history, so it’s real easy to put yourself in that guy’s shoes and kind of see yourself in that. And you see him make that walk in Anaheim.
“I just remember him walking now. It says (on the screen), ‘Born in Yuma, Arizona’. You see the crowd going absolutely insane, and I just remember vividly feeling like, ‘Oh man! One day, one day, I want to feel whatever that feels like. I want to feel that.’
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“So that was like the thought leading into International Fight Week. And then I step out and I look up (at the crowd), and I keep looking up because there’s still more people to go. You know, you just keep looking up, and it’s insane. It was everything I imagined and sweeter, man. It truly was.”
That walkout, and the performance that followed, showed that Delgado had truly arrived on the sport’s biggest stage. Now he’s ready for his second successive numbered event as he prepares to face Wood – a fighter for whom he holds immense respect.
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