Daniel Cormier shares the backup plan if Brock Lesnar is unavailable

With a successful UFC 230 heavyweight title defense opposite Derek Lewis now in the books, UFC light heavyweight and heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier is now looking to the future.

At present, the expectation is that he will next defend his heavyweight title against former champion and current WWE star Brock Lesnar. With Lesnar’s future still uncertain, however, Cormier has a backup plan: Jon Jones.

Of course, Jon Jones’ future isn’t exactly certain either. The former light heavyweight champion is currently slated to fight Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 232 in December, and if he loses this fight, it will suck a lot of the value out of a potential trilogy fight with Cormier.

Luckily, Cormier has a tertiary plan in place if neither Lesnar nor Jones is available: a rematch with Stipe Miocic, the man he knocked out to win the heavyweight title in July.

Daniel Cormier outlined the options for his future at the UFC 230 post-fight press conference.

“If Lesnar can’t fight and Jones loses, I’ll fight Stipe,” Cormier said at UFC 230’s post-fight press conference (transcript via MMA Fighting).

“If it’s not Lesnar at heavyweight, it’ll be Stipe. He deserves the rematch, I never said he didn’t. And I’ve always said it’ll be him if not Lesnar. I just didn’t want to fight him on three weeks notice, you’ve gotta understand that. I didn’t. We wouldn’t put our best product out there if it was him and I on three weeks. It’s better to have a full camp if we do it again.”

Who do you want to see Daniel Cormier fight next after his impressive submission defeat of Derrick Lewis at UFC 230? Join the debate in the comments section below.

This article first appeared on BJPENN.COM on 11/4/2018.