Barber shops and restaurants: UFC champ Daniel Cormier has a post-career plan

UFC light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier will hang up his gloves on March 20, 2019 – or so is the plan for right now.

Cormier (20-1 MMA, 9-1 UFC) has set a hard date for walking away from the sport. But what happens after that? Will he coach? Take on another job? Live a life of leisure?

As it turns out, Cormier already has plenty of irons in the fire. He’s a partner in a pair of restaurants. He owns two barbershops in Southern California, and two wrestling schools in Northern California.

“I’ve done a good job of trying to diversify myself,” he told MMAjunkie Radio. “We’ve got a lot of different things going that will hopefully help us maintain life after fighting is done.”

Despite their competitive outcome, his biggest return on investment has been a pair of fights with his longtime rival Jon Jones (23-1 MMA, 17-1 UFC). A pair of pay-per-view headliners at UFC 182 and UFC 214 did good numbers at the box office, leading to big payouts for both fighters. Cormier’s disclosed pay for the latter fight clocked in at a cool $1 million.

This past Saturday at UFC 220, Cormier likely took home the same disclosed number for pounding out top contender Volkan Oezdemir (15-2 MMA, 3-1 UFC). He’s now healing from injuries suffered during the fight and hopes to fight in July and December.

“If I could fight at the end of the year, and maybe sneak another one in in February, I could get three more in before I’m done,” Cormier said.

Lingering on the horizon is the fate of Jones, who currently awaits his fate on a second UFC anti-doping violation stemming from the UFC 214 rematch with Cormier. Jones faces up to a four-year suspension, but he has denied intentional use of banned supplements, and one UFC executive has backed his account.

Cormier wants one last shot at Jones for redemption and to solidify his status as the sport’s best light heavyweight. Whether he does or not is yet to be known. But the way it sounds, he won’t be in a position where he needs a rubber match to make ends meet.

For more on the UFC’s upcoming schedule, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.