Drunk driver puts del Rosario’s fighting future in jeopardy

Up-and-coming heavyweight Shane del Rosario was on track to fight Daniel Cormier on the same Strikeforce card as the Alistair Overeem/Fabricio Werdum bout in June. That was until his car was hit by a drunk driver early Thursday evening. Now, his bout with Cormier is off, and his fighting future is up in the air.

To a fighter, six months is an eternity, and a long time to go without a fight and the paycheck that comes with it. Del Rosario's last bout, a submission of Lavar Johnson, was in February. Now, he has no idea when his next bout will be. He is pursuing a lawsuit, but no court can give him back the time he's put into this training camp, or the spoils that would come with a win over Cormier.

Del Rosario isn't the only one affected by the crash. Cormier's last bout was in January, and he was looking forward to the step up in competition that del Rosario represented. Now, Strikeforce has to scramble to find a heavyweight that will take on Cormier and his Olympic-level wrestling on short notice, or he will have to wait to fight.

The frustrating part is that this wasn't an injury sustained in training. Those are part of fighting, and fights get moved around all the time because of training-related injuries. Del Rosario was simply sitting at a stoplight and was hit by a drunk idiot who made the destructive decision of driving a car. She was lucky that she didn't kill del Rosario. In making that stupid, self-centered choice to drive while drunk, she affected the careers of two exciting heavyweight prospects.