Gotta take Rogan and the UFC to task over this whole Stephen a Smith thing. Smith's style is definitely not anything I like but there is nothing he said that's way out of line on that post fight analysis. Rogan spends a lot of time rightly criticizing the extremists on the far right and left for being overly sensitive cunts but in this case he's being way too sensitive.
The clip I saw of the lost fight didn't show Smith say Cowboy quit. He said he put an atrocious performance and got hit and didn't seem to want to be there. That's 100 percent plausible. Cowboy is like the Tony Romo of mma. Prolific career. Very good. But when it's championship time he just wasn't on that level, and over the last 2 years I think he's realized he can't beat Khabib or Woodley/Usman for a title. Can't happen.
He also realizes he has a name and a following and for at least several fights he can get paid to go in and show up. It happens in boxing all the time. Over the hill fighter with a name keeps taking fights for the money but he doesn't fight to win anymore. If the win is there and he doesn't have to take a massive beating he'll take it, but he's no longer going to fight through the fires of hell to go the distance or have a shot to win. We've seen fighters like Thiago Santos go toe to toe with Jon Jones on two shreded knees (and in my opinion he won 3-2 but got robbed by politics). Cowboy is plenty tough enough to fight through those early shots but at this point why do it? Just go down and be ready to fight again asap to cash more checks. Now he has that little girl to take care of and I think that's exactly what he did.
MMA people like Rogan have been clamoring to be taken seriously with the major American sports, but now that they're on ESPN and ESPN is sending its most visible and highly paid personality to cover it they can't be getting all bitchy and butt hurt when that guy calls out a horrible performance by the main event fighter. Especially in a fight like this that was an obvious sham from the very beginning to boost the promotion's Golden Goose.
If they want to stay a niche sport on the fringes and live in their own little bubble where they control the narrative they can do it but then get off ESPN and stop trying to go mainstream.