Dos Santos after 3rd straight KO loss: It'd be 'huge waste' to retire

Junior dos Santos will not be retiring after his defeat at UFC 252.

The former heavyweight champion suffered his third straight knockout loss against Jairzinho Rozenstruik on Saturday's main card in Las Vegas. UFC president Dana White said after the fight he planned to assess Dos Santos' future. But the Brazilian said earlier this week it'd be a mistake to hang up his gloves.

"I'm feeling great, so I think it would be a huge waste to consider (retirement) at the moment," Dos Santos told MMA Fighting's Guilherme Cruz. "Of course, (I lost to) tough athletes, knockout artists ... I plan on moving forward and working hard to get better, and showing that I'm living (in) an excellent moment."

Dos Santos won the first round on two of three judges' scorecards, but then Rozenstruik put away the 36-year-old in the second frame with a big right hand.

"Cigano," whose last victory came against Derrick Lewis in March 2019, said he plans to sit down with his team and figure out why he hasn't been able to get back into the winning column.

Before Dos Santos' current stretch of setbacks, which he called a "bad phase" of his veteran career, the former champ had never lost more than one fight in a row. He added that Saturday's loss was more frustrating than his defeats to Francis Ngannou and Curtis Blaydes, because he was winning until the finish.

"I found the distance, I was seeing everything clearly, everything was going well, and all of a sudden ... it's that heavyweight thing, especially against Jairzinho, who hits really hard, one of his punches grazed and you go out for a brief moment," Dos Santos said. "And that's enough to take you out of your game and your opponent uses that to finish the fight. I was doing really well and it was unfortunate that I lost."