Henry Cejudo: ‘I was seeing double’ after eye poke, calls for Song Yadong rematch

Henry Cejudo is experiencing double vision after a bad eye poke forced a premature end to his UFC Seattle main event clash with Song Yadong this Saturday, and he wants a rematch.

Cejudo was poked in the eye with 80 seconds left in the third round and used the five-minute break to recover. He decided to resume fighting, but told referee Jason Herzog “I can’t f*cking see” once the round ended.

The doctor stopped the bout at the start of Roun 4 to go to a technical decision and Song was awarded the victory.

“We wanted to finish the fight, man,” Cejudo said on a video posted on social media. “Obviously I got poked in the eye with two damn fingers. And typically like when I get poked, I’m good. The same reason why I was smiling or whatnot, but after those five minutes were up, I still couldn’t see anything. Or it’s not that I couldn’t see anything, I was seeing double.”

The former two-division UFC champion admitted he initially thought he could recover and continue fighting, but his vision never went back to normal. Cejudo said he was handed a 30-day suspension by the local athletic commission after the main event bout, and will see a specialist on Sunday to hopefully be “f*cking normal” again. As for Herzog’s handing of the situation, Cejudo feels Song should have been deducted a point for his foul, which would have made the result a majority draw.

“And it’s unfortunate, dude,” Cejudo said. “Did Song do it intentionally? No. But should there be a point deducted? One hundred percent, man. I think it’s like basketball, where there’s technical fouls. If you travel, it’s still technical. I just hope that the UFC could maybe allow replays for things like that and then the referee can make a decision whether if it wasn’t intentional or not.

“As a fighter, one of the first things that the referee says when they go in the back is like, you cannot stick your fingers out like that. And I think the warnings are already set before the fight. I eventually got f*cking poked with two fingers. … I’m like, maybe I can rough this out, but then Song came and he got that five minute break and I’m just like, man, I saw four arms, dude. It’s unfortunate.”

“I think there’s a lot of things that maybe we could do,” he continued. “And it’s not Song’s fault. I’m not pissed at him. But I will say this for Jason Herzog. I’m curious to talk to you, man. I got kicked in the balls a couple of times, and then eye-poked. Bro, something has to be done. And I think as referees, too, we could also learn. But I also think for the UFC, maybe there should be something where the referee is able to see the replay and say, all right, man, there’s one, even if it wasn’t intentional, it’s still done. You still cannot do this. Apparently I couldn’t see no more, so apparently when the round started Song was still — I still can’t see it, but they’re telling me he was kind of like a zombie with his fingers out. It’s so unfortunate, man.”

UFC CEO Dana White said at the post-fight press conference he wasn’t interested in booking an immediate rematch between the bantamweights, which Cejudo begs him to reconsider.

“Dana White, I know you said that you’re not interested in that rematch. Dude, let’s run it back,” Cejudo said. “There were still two rounds left. The pace was picking up. He was hurt. Look at my face, look at his face. Dude, we’re scrapping. I think we should run it back. Dana, I respect you, I hope we could run this back.”

Watch Cejudo’s video statement below.