Stipe Miocic (born August 19, 1982) is an American former professional mixed martial artist[7][8] and currently works as a firefighter.

[10][11] Prior to his MMA career, Miocic was a Golden Gloves boxing champion and NCAA Division I wrestler at Cleveland State University.

[8] Miocic played baseball and American football and wrestled while at Eastlake North High School.

[21] As a member of Jeff Forehand's baseball team at Trevecca Nazarene, he hit .344 with seven home runs in his senior year and helped the Trojans win the 2005 TranSouth Athletic Conference regular season and tournament titles.

He won the Cleveland Golden Gloves and made it to the nationals, winning his first two bouts in the quarter-finals before being eliminated in a decision loss to future world title contender Bryant Jennings.

[27] Miocic faced Phil De Fries on February 15, 2012, at UFC on Fuel TV: Sanchez vs.

[43] Miocic won the fight by TKO due to punches early in the first round and received a "Performance of the Night" bonus as well.

[44][45] A rescheduled bout with dos Santos eventually took place as the main event at UFC on Fox 13 on December 13, 2014.

[56] Subsequently, Rothwell was removed from the card the following day after the promotion deemed that a suitable opponent could not be arranged on short notice.

[57] In turn, Miocic was quickly rebooked and faced Andrei Arlovski in a title eliminator on January 2, 2016, at UFC 195.

Despite taking hard kicks to the shin, Miocic landed powerful punches with devastating accuracy to drop dos Santos, he then followed up with ground and pound to win the fight via TKO midway through the first round.

[75][76] When he was announced as the winner, instead of the usual practice, he took the belt from Dana White and had his coach Marcus Marinelli put it around him.

[77][78] Miocic received congratulations from both the President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović and Prime Minister of Croatia Andrej Plenković.

Miocic was the favorite heading into the bout, mainly due to his natural size and power advantage as well as his dangerous striking on the feet.

[82] The knockout came in controversial fashion, as Cormier was warned multiple times by referee Marc Goddard for extending his fingers towards Miocic's face and poking him in the eye.

[84] Miocic won the fight by TKO in the fourth round after landing several clean left hooks to the body and following it up with punches to the head, reclaiming the title.

[87] On June 9, 2020, it was announced that the trilogy bout between Miocic and Cormier was signed to take place at UFC 252 on August 15, 2020.

[93] However, on October 25, it was announced that the bout was scrapped after Jones sustained a pectoral muscle injury that required surgery which put him out of action for eight months.

When asked by Joe Rogan why he still works as a firefighter despite being a UFC champion, he stated that he needs something to fall back to after his fighting career is over.

[73] He married Ryan Marie Carney on June 18, 2016, at the Divine Word Catholic Church in Kirtland, Ohio.

[98][99] They welcomed their second child, a boy named Mateo Cruz, on August 28, 2021, as announced on Miocic's Instagram by Bruce Buffer.