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It was a crushing series of blows for a young man who is one of the most positive folks in a business not known for its optimism. It even hit his father and coach, Gintas, pretty hard…but only for a minute.
“When he saw me crying, when the UFC told me that I’m out, he started crying with me, but he almost got angry,” said Bukauskas of his dad’s reaction. “He’s like, ‘Well, we just got to f**king train harder. We need to get better. We’re going to be back there. All you need to do is fix everything, figure out where we went wrong and get back at it. Simple as that.’ So my dad has never been the one to give up, and that’s been a massive help in this whole process. He’s been the guardian angel watching over me. It’s like I have an angel in human form pushing me through the times where it’s very easy to give up.”
UFC 284: Fight By Fight Preview
At that moment, the comeback truly began in earnest. Of course, there was the little matter of the knee injury, not a tweak but something a lot more serious.
“It was the most painful surgery I’ve ever had in my life,” said Bukauskas. “My physio came to watch the operation so that she could see what had actually been done to it. And she said it looked like a fricking construction site. It was literally ligaments everywhere, artificial ligaments everywhere. They had plates and bolts. And she said it’s the most complex operation she ever seen in her life. But thank God for the UFC for covering that operation and thank God for the amazing doctors that were able to do such an amazing job.”
