Christian Leroy Duncan’s exit music was composed by his late friend, Joel Daniel Westcar.
Leroy Duncan is scheduled to face veteran Gregory Rodriguez on Saturday at UFC 304 in front of a home crowd in Manchester, England. In a “UFC Connected” video, Duncan can be seen visiting the grave of Westcarr, whom he calls Zozo.
“Come meet my friend Zozo. We’re at his resting place, which is a place I visit all the time,” Duncan said. “He was such a talented musical artist, and we always said we’d meet at the top, whichever path we went down.”
Tributes pour in for beloved Joel Westcarr (20), who died in a motorcycle accident https://t.co/6Sv2wJ4biQ pic.twitter.com/4Nvw4BoihM
— Daniel Chipperfield (@DanChipperfield)
April 4, 2016
Westcarr was a musician who died in a motorcycle accident on April 3, 2016, at age 20. Duncan, who was just beginning his amateur mixed martial arts career at the time, remembers reading about the accident but not going into detail. When he called Westcarr’s brother, Duncan learned that his best friend had died.
UFC 304: Edwards vs. Muhammad airs Saturday at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+. Order now! “I woke up this morning and there was an article in the paper saying he’d been in a motorcycle accident and was pretty injured,” Duncan said. “No name, nothing. I called his oldest brother, who I’m still really close with to this day. He was a little depressed on the phone and just said, ‘He’s gone.’ I remember this feeling hitting me. I’ll never forget the words we said to each other at the top: See you later. I carry those words with me every day.” [takes a
moment].”
But Westcarr’s legacy lives on in Duncan’s customary entrance music, “Fly Team,” and hearing it in front of a hometown crowd at The O2 Arena during his promotional debut at UFC 286 in March 2023 was a big boost for Duncan.
“For my UFC debut, I went to the O2 Arena and heard my friend Zozo’s song playing over the speakers in front of thousands of people,” he said. “That’s a big motivation for me. For me, he’s always with us. I represent him and his family. My good friend. That’s what I’ve always got.”
Duncan’s debut ended in a TKO win after his opponent, Dusko Todorovic, suffered a knee injury in the first round. Duncan suffered the only loss of his career to Armen Petrosyan in his second year at UFC, but the former Cage Warriors middleweight champion has since bounced back with back-to-back stoppage wins. The only time Duncan did not use the “Fly Team” track during his time at UFC was prior to his TKO win over Denis Tiuriullin in November 2023.
