Longtime mixed martial arts (MMA) veteran, Jonathan Ivey, did not fake a heart attack inside the cage and did not throw his fight against Travis Fulton, which took place at Colesseum Combat 45 last weekend in Kokomo, Indiana.
“Big John” insists his in-cage theatrics (see them here) were nothing more than standard taunts, akin to what Anderson Silva used to do during his middleweight reign for Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).
”I’ve seen people saying I faked a heart attack, that is ridiculous,” Ivey told MMA Fighting. “Those people have clearly never seen me fight. I’m always doing funny stuff while I fight. Travis had just kicked me and it made a loud smack, so I was just playing around like it hurt.”
Later in the fight, Ivey had Fulton in trouble and was probably seconds away from the technical knockout victory. Instead of securing the win, the 42-year-old heavyweight backed off his opponent and tapped out, taking the loss.
“I threw a couple more punches and begged the ref to stop it. The ref wouldn’t. So I stood up and backed away and bent over to tap the mat,” Ivey said. “I signed up to fight Travis, I didn’t sign up to hit him repeatedly after his eyes rolled back and he was laying there defenseless.”
As it turns out, reports of another poached Salmon remain unfounded.