Strikeforce heavyweight Fabricio Werdum (14-5-1) wants fans to know that he is sorry for his performance last Saturday night against Ailistair Overeem, that “it wasn’t me fighting.”
Both he and Overeem met in their quarterfinal bout as part of the Strikeforce World Grand Prix Heavyweight Tournament. The match would see Werdum continually attempt to bring the fight to the mat, at one point begging his opponent to jump into his guard. While his opponent, Overeem proved less than impressive, trying to keep the fight standing throughout the three rounds.
Fans and media have been very critical of both fighters, sparking each fighter to apologize for their performances.
Overeem spoke out during his post fight interviews, while Werdum issued his apology during an interview with Sherdog.com.
“I’m still trying to figure out what happened to me that night,” Werdum told Sherdog.com. “It wasn’t me fighting. What I did was awful, ugly to see. I want to apologize to Brazilian fans and MMA fans. I didn’t listen to my corner. Rafael [Cordeiro, Kings MMA leader] was telling me to keep striking, not to try to pull guard, but I didn’t do that. I wasn’t listening to him, wasn’t focusing on the fight the way that I should’ve been. It wasn’t a good fight for me or Overeem.”
“I felt he was much, much stronger than me,” Werdum said of Overeem. “I tried to take him down many times, with double-legs, single-legs… but it was like hitting a wall. He was impressively strong. It wasn’t a lack of training. I worked hard with Mark Munoz, I took down everyone at the gym, but it was different in the fight. I just tried to pull him to my guard after I failed on my takedown attempts. I gotta get stronger to keep fighting at the highest level of heavyweight.”
Check out the rest of the interview at the Sherdog.com link above as Werdum gives his thoughts on the semi-final matchup between Overeem and Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva.