Top ESPN MMA analyst says Colby Covington 'needs to retire'

“You were right about one thing, he needs to retire,” Thomas told Sportsnaut/Ringside Intel. “He needs to retire and take his a-- back somewhere. This is the thing, when Tyron Woodley was 39 years old these guys were beating up on him and they were all pumping their chests and waving their fists around. But he was 39 years old.

“These guys have to understand as soon as you hit 37 or 38, that’s it for you. And Colby spent his last couple of good years sitting on the sidelines talking trash. He should have been fighting because I do not think he’ll be able to come back and ever put together a winning streak like he thinks he can in his own head.”

Thomas feels Covington’s claim of incurring a broken foot early in the fight is just nonsense and another of a pair of excuses to disguise the frustrating fact that his best athletic years are behind him as he closes in on his 36th birthday later this month.

“If his foot was hurt, he didn’t say anything the night of. He blamed losing that decision on being a Trump fan [originally],” said Thomas. “But he said ‘I waited until the X-rays came in to say my foot was broken, so here’s the real excuse.’ Why didn’t he say it that night?

“‘My foot is hurt, I don’t know what I did, congrats to Leon.’ Then he would have been able to turn it over. But that fact that he went to the Trump excuse first, now it’s his foot — the reality is he’s older now. Colby was a damn good fighter in his prime, but he’s older now. He’s never going to be the same.”