Author: By Thomas Gerbasi

It’s one of the more difficult techniques to prepare for in the world of mixed martial arts, and one that may be impossible to replicate with one hundred percent accuracy. But Chris Leben tried his best in training to find sparring partners to match the combined burst of speed, punching, and berserker fury that has been the stylistic hallmark of his Saturday opponent, Wanderlei Silva.

“We’ve been doing our best,” he said. “Obviously you can’t train like Wanderlei’s gonna come at me, at full speed. You’re gonna have to find out how it goes when it goes. But I’ve been putting on a face helmet and having some faster guys tee off on me and throw those bursts like that and try to get the heck out of the way.”

Kinda puts the rest the theory that professional prizefighting is a glamorous profession. Does Leben ever wonder why he puts himself though this peculiar brand of torture?

“Every day,” he laughs. “I’m hungry, I’m sore, I’m tired. I’m just going ‘man, I should have stayed in school.’”

Nah, can’t picture it. In fact, if you want the definition of a fighter, you look to guys like Leben. For all the hard days of training, days when you wish you were anywhere but the gym (especially when you live in Hawaii), when the bell rings, all is forgotten, and all that matters is getting yours before your opponent gets his.

If that sounds like a guy nicknamed “The Axe Murderer,” the same one Leben will be looking across the Octagon at this weekend in the UFC 132 co-main event, that’s not a coincidence. In fact, when asked in a recent interview if any fighters today remind him of himself, the first name out of Silva’s mouth was Chris Leben.

“It’s cool, I like it, and it’s kinda what I want,” said Leben. “We’re both really not the most technical guys on the planet, but we go in there, we get the job done and we keep the fans on the edge of their seat. It’s an honor that he said that.”

In any circumstance, hearing such a compliment from the former PRIDE champion would be something to get excited about, but for Leben, it goes deeper than that considering that one of the first fighters he latched on to as a fan when he began his own career was the Brazilian bomber.
 
“It was right after I started training,” said Leben when asked about his first exposure to Silva. “There was this Japanese toy store in Portland, and I’d go down there and he had recorded copies from Japan of PRIDE back before you could order it in the States, and that’s when I first saw him. I thought he was great, I loved his style.”

And when Leben went into the ring or cage, he went one step further than just being a fan; he wanted to pay homage to Silva by delivering the same kind of memorable, go for broke performances.

“I really like to have exciting fights, and I watched him and all of his fights were always exciting,” he said. “He goes out there and goes for it, and I appreciated that, and in some aspects I think I tried to emulate that in the early stages of my career.”

Some would say he never stopped. A pro since 2002 and a UFC mainstay since 2005, when he entered the Octagon after a stint on The Ultimate Fighter’s first season, Leben has hit a few bumps in the road during his 17 fight (11-6) UFC career, some self-inflicted, some issued by fighters like Anderson Silva, Michael Bisping, and Jason MacDonald, but through it all, “The Crippler” has always found a way to land on his feet.

Take 2010 for example. After back to back losses to Bisping and Jake Rosholt, Leben’s UFC tenure was on thin ice as he began the year. He went on to decision Jay Silva in January, and then stop previously unbeaten Aaron Simpson in June. That should have been impressive enough, but two weeks after the Simpson bout, he stepped in on short notice against Yoshihiro Akiyama at UFC 116 and delivered a Fight of the Night performance by submitting the Japanese star in the final round.

It was the comeback story of the year, and he expected to keep the momentum going in 2011, but on New Year’s Day he ran into a buzzsaw in the form of Brian Stann and stopped just 3:37 into the first round.

“You know how it goes,” he said. “Hindsight’s 20/20 and it’s water under the bridge. Stann fought a fantastic fight, absolutely.”

After the bout, it was learned that Leben entered the bout ill after an overindulgence of candy following the weigh-in. But in the interest of not taking away from Stann’s victory, Leben brushes off such talk with a simple “That was my bad,” before adding, “I think that the whole fight just got started off on the wrong foot for me. He (Stann) did a great job from start to finish.”

And oddly enough, everything worked out for the best for the 30-year old, as he was given the fight he had been asking for in Silva for July 2nd.

“My brother called me a couple days ago and he said ‘you know Chris, you’ve been talking about getting this fight for years and years,’” said Leben. “And I have. I think maybe I wasn’t ready then, but I’m ready now.”
 
That’s not to say that he’s ready to make any bold predictions on the outcome or start calling out Silva to stand in the middle of the Octagon and trade with him. That strategy is probably a given, and it’s giving Leben just the right dose of nerves before a bout the fight world can’t wait to see. So, the million dollar question is, will Leben be looking forward to soaking in the atmosphere and the crowd’s cheers on fight night like Silva is?

“Afterward, yeah,” he laughs. “As soon as the fight’s over and I won, yeah. But when I walk out I really don’t focus on the crowd or anything like that because I’ve still got a job to do. But I’m very excited and very honored to be able to fight Wanderlei in the show, right before the main event. It’s a pretty cool deal.”

 

16 months is a long time to go without a Wanderlei Silva fight. No wrist loosening before the bout, no staredowns, no wild flurries and emphatic knockouts. It kinda renders everything else a little less exciting in comparison. And that’s just the view from outside the Octagon. Just think how “The Axe Murderer” feels about sitting on the sidelines while nursing himself back to health after various injuries.

“I missed my fans, I missed the crowd, I miss the emotion that fighting gives to me,” said Silva, getting more amped up with each syllable. “I’ve never been out as long as this and I’m so excited to come back to fight. For me, it’s like I’m going to debut again, and I get to debut in the co-main event of UFC 132. That’s a great, great opportunity that the boss gave to me.”

UFC President Dana White didn’t give him any welcome back gimme though. In his UFC 132 foe, Chris Leben, Silva will be fighting a near clone who is seemingly only happy when the fists are flying at close range. Then again, the former PRIDE legend doesn’t mind being in there with someone he won’t have to chase for 15 minutes. He won’t have to look long to find “The Crippler.”

“Chris Leben fights like me and has a style like my style, and I’m so happy to not create, but influence, his style in spirit,” said Silva. “Every time you see one guy fighting hard, giving his all, and not being afraid to lose, you say ‘man, this guy fights like Wanderlei Silva.’ And sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but every time you make the fans happy.”

For nearly 15 years, Silva has been making fans happy, an amazing run any way you slice it. And while he’s just about to turn 35 the day after his match with Leben, after a decade and a half of wars in the ring, Octagon, and gym, his body said ‘no more’ after his middleweight debut in February of 2010, a UFC 110 win over Michael Bisping.

First he broke three ribs and was forced to pull out of a UFC 116 bout last July with Yoshihiro Akiyama (a fight that ultimately went to Leben), then he went in for knee surgery that kept him on the shelf for four months. It wasn’t an easy time for someone who had made fighting his life, but he managed to stay busy.

“I was hurt and had a really bad injury,” said Silva, who makes his home in Las Vegas, “but now I feel good, my knee is better, my ribs are better, and I was out but I didn’t stop working. I made a lot of appearances, I worked in my gym, I spent time with my family, and I used the time for good things. I stopped training for four months and after that I would train once a day, after that two times a day, and now I’m back to my regular routine. It’s not so easy, the fighter’s life. It’s very hard to get ready for a fight, but I feel really good, I trained really hard, and I know I’m gonna give a great show for the fans.”

And even though this is his second go-round at 185 pounds, he laughs when asked if it’s been easier cutting down for Leben.

“No, not so easy,” said Silva. “I (originally) dropped from 225 and right now I have a really hard diet and I need to train hard. It’s not so easy. It’s like the first fight (with Bisping). When I checked the weight and made 185, it was my first victory. (Laughs) Especially right now, I’m gonna be 35 years old, and when you’re that age, sometimes it’s not so easy to lose a lot of weight.”

He has had plenty of good training partners and coaches to push him though, most notably his former coach at the Chute Boxe Academy in Brazil, Rafael Cordeiro, and an old friend who stopped in for a couple days at Cordeiro’s gym in Southern California, former UFC light heavyweight champion Mauricio “Shogun” Rua.

“He has unbelievable talent,” said Silva of Rua. “He has a natural talent, he’s so strong, and I’m so happy to train with him again. I trained with him for 10 years back in Brazil, and now we’re back to train together, and I think if he continues training with Cordeiro, he can be champion again.”

It’s almost like old times for the trio that terrorized Japan back in the PRIDE days with a Muay Thai-based attack that left opponents either cowering in a corner or face down on the canvas. Silva smiles at the recollection.

“The old days with the same coach,” he said. Cordeiro is an unbelievable coach and he has a unique system. “Shogun” trained with him from white belt to black belt in Brazil; he’s a pure Cordeiro student. I’ve been training with him for 17 years, and he’s great. I love his system, I like the energy he gives to training, and his talent. He knows how to get us the victory.”

Cordeiro led Silva to his three round decision win over Bisping in Australia, and despite two previous setbacks against Rich Franklin and Quinton Jackson, “The Axe Murderer” is one win away from even bigger fights, and dare we speculate, a title shot is he keeps winning?

“I need to look at my performance,” said Silva. “If I have a good performance, one day I’ll go back to fighting for the title. This is what I want but I can’t talk about that right now because I have to go out and put on a really good show. If I do that, I know the boss will give me the chance one more time again.”

Yeah, it’s been a long 16 months waiting to see Wanderlei Silva in action again. How long? Silva thinks he might get overwhelmed the first moment he hears the fans at the MGM Grand Garden Arena cheering for him Saturday night.

“I think I’m gonna start crying,” he laughs. “I’m one guy inside the gym. Inside the gym I’m doing good, I have the technique, I have the cardio, all things. But in front of my public, they give me energy and motivation. For the guy to beat me inside the Octagon in a real fight, he’s going to need to kill me because I’m going to kill or die. I never fight in the middle.”

If you get UFC lightweight contender George Sotiropoulos talking about the intricacies of the fight game, you will get a master class of knowledge from one of mixed martial arts’ most dedicated students. But when you reveal that many believed that his decision loss to Dennis Siver at UFC 127 in February, which snapped an eight fight winning streak, was shocking, his answer is brief and to the point.

“I was also shocked,” he said.

What may have been the stunner is that many perceived Siver as a fighter who would be a prime candidate for Sotiropoulos to take down and submit, in the process moving ever closer to a world title shot. But after a slow start, one similar to the one he had in his win over Joe Lauzon last November, Sotiropoulos didn’t make the adjustments he made back at UFC 123, and after 15 minutes, he ran out of time. The decision was unanimous for the Germany’s Siver.

“I guess I did start a little slow in that fight,” said Sotiropoulos, who had not lost since a disqualification at the hands of Japanese star Shinya Aoki in 2006. “I kinda came back into the fight in round two, I pressed a little harder, and I could have won round two, and I think round three could have gone either way. But I think the two knockdowns in round one is what won him the fight. If you took away those knockdowns, the fight could have gone either way or it could have been a draw. I was pretty shocked and I really thought I’d get that guy to the ground and be able to finish the fight there. But it just never happened and I was really focused on that in that fight.”

What followed was plenty of analysis of what went wrong, beginning as soon as Sotiropoulos and his team were back in the hotel the next morning. The way he saw it, a load of traveling between the Lauzon and Siver fights didn’t help matters, but in the end, he had no excuses for the loss when it came to preparation.

“I got into a good groove and had really good training and really hard training, and my sparring went well, my conditioning went great,” he said, “so I can’t really attribute it to one particular thing. I had some other things that I had to deal with, nothing major, just life itself, and there were so many things that I had to accomplish that I was just really, really busy, and I think the combination of factors affected me. But I was well-prepared, my weight cut went really well, and I rehydrated really well.”

What it may have come down to was the training he had briefly done with Siver a while back when the two were in Las Vegas at the same time.

“I trained with Siver back in Vegas and I had no problem wrestling with him or even grappling with him,” he said, but on fight night, he wasn’t able to have the same success with the kickboxer, and while he took him seriously, he took the idea that he would be able to take him to the mat and finish him there even more so.

“I legitimately take everybody seriously,” said the Australia native. “Everyone says that, but I truly mean it. I have an approach that’s very comprehensive, it’s a holistic approach, I’m addressing everything in my training, and I just didn’t make the adjustments in that fight. I didn’t adjust the gameplan to where I try to impose my will standing against Siver, and that was, I think, the mistake that cost me. I was too focused on the takedown in that fight, and he was able to capitalize on that. He knew where the danger was coming from, so he was able to defend it and execute his gameplan, which was striking.”

The loss hurt Sotiropoulos’ immediate title hopes, but in this game, if you let one defeat crush you, you won’t get very far. You’ve got to let it go and move on, and this Saturday night in Las Vegas, Sotiropoulos will do just that in a bout against Brazil’s Rafael dos Anjos. But before he was able to let the Siver fight go, he had to go back to the laboratory and dissect everything.

“I really look at my footage closely, and I studied that fight like I studied all my fights,” he said. “I pretty much broke my whole game down and looked at what I can do to improve the striking, wrestling, grappling, and I made adjustments to training and looked at how I could improve those aspects in my training. And I’ve done that and hopefully everything translates into the fight. There were some things that appeared straightway that were noticeable and we made those adjustments. And obviously when you study the footage and break it down frame by frame, then you start noticing subtleties that you hadn’t picked up before. And those things aren’t really visible to the eye until you break things down frame by frame, which is what I did.”

Frame by frame? Really?

“It’s very time consuming, and sometimes I could only compare it to pulling out your teeth with pliers,” he laughs after what is likely a huge understatement. “The amount of dedication and commitment that it takes is ridiculous. I don’t place a dollar value on it, but I’d be making a lot of money if I was getting paid for it, let’s put it that way. It’s that obsession to be better, and I guess if you want to get better at something, you’ll do whatever it takes to make things happen. Isn’t that life? Isn’t that what you do as an adult?”

You would hope, but only a select few follow through with it, and Sotiropoulos’ Spartan work ethic and single-minded devotion to the sport have made him perhaps the hardest working fighter in the business. And now the fun really begins for the soon to be 34-year old, because many of his peers might look at the Siver fight as the blueprint for beating him. He’s not concerned.

“I think any loss will be scrutinized and observed by a competitor and opponent because they’re gonna see there’s a chink in the armor,” he said. “I would. But at the same time, I’ve studied opponents in the past and I’ve seen weaknesses in fights opponents won rather than in fights they’ve lost. So it kinda contradicts what we say about the loss. They may do that, but it’s a little simple. To really get an assessment of a fighter, you can’t really look at just one fight; you need to look at the complete picture and look at a series of fights.”

He’s done that with himself and with dos Anjos, and as he approaches this ultra-important bout, don’t expect a brand new George Sotiropoulos on Saturday; simply look for the ol’ reliable version with some new tweaks.

“It’s not really the case that I needed an overhaul in my training,” he said. “It was just a matter of making subtle adjustments to address the problems. You can’t get to this point and need an overhaul. I never would have gotten this far. It’s like when a race car comes in for a pitstop; it doesn’t come in for an overhaul; it just comes in for a little bit of air and water, and to balance the wheels. It’s just minor adjustments.”

So keeping on the automotive theme, it’s time for Sotiropoulos to rev up the engine after a crash and a trip to the body shop and put the car back on the road. As for the road back to where he was before the Siver bout, he’s prepared for that trip, no matter how long it takes.

“I’ve had a lot of time to ponder that issue and that aspect, and look at it from so many different perspectives,” he said. “It took me so long to get to that point, and then that last fight I took a step back and it was a bump in the road. Now I’m not in title contention, but I was, and I think I can be back there with a couple more wins. But that was never really the focus. My focus was to win every fight, fight by fight. It was never really just to win and then be in line for the title. I never really thought that way. For me, it was about the journey that I was on and I still am. I wasn’t really counting how many fights I won. I gave it no thought until I saw articles written about it. I was kind of shocked and I never gave those aspects any consideration because I was just so focused on what I was doing.  It was like I was speeding on the freeway and just looking straight and not looking at what was going on beside me or what I was passing. I took the loss pretty hard, but I said basically that there’s only one remedy to this, and that’s just to get back and do what I was doing. If I won that last fight, what would I be doing? I’d be training. So if I lost, why should that change anything for me?”

Then it was back to work.

Some professional athletes run to the media, never seeing a camera that they didn’t like. Lightweight contender Matt Wiman, an affable sort with a good sense of humor who is not afraid to tell his story, is still getting used to the whole process, even though he’s fought 10 times in the UFC and even appeared on season five of The Ultimate Fighter.

And it’s not that he’s uncomfortable in the glare of the spotlight, but he knows the perils that come with believing the hype placed on your shoulders.

“I think recognition gives guys a false sense of security,” said Wiman. “People knowing who I am, they think I’m the best fighter, and at the end of the day, some super hungry cat that’s up and coming and fighting out of fear can get you. And the recognition doesn’t make the established fighter any better. So I just try to stay more focused on what I think about myself and what my team and family think about me versus what other people do.”

Nearly seven years into a pro career that began with three fights (all wins) on one night in August of 2004, Wiman has seen plenty, and in doing so, he’s decided to take his own path through the fight game, one that may not coincide with the usual M.O. for success.

So maybe that’s why he went on TUF after already making his UFC debut, why he hasn’t done 600 interviews leading up to his UFC 132 bout with Dennis Siver this Saturday, or why he’s chosen to roll the dice over the years when it’s come to training camps. It’s not that he doesn’t take things seriously, but in jumping to different teams and gyms while he and his Courtney live their lives as a young, married couple, he may be taking a chance that he will one day end up in a place with no UFC-level coaches and training partners. Wiman, who is now living in Arvada, Colorado, and finishing up his second camp there, understands the risks, but so far, it’s worked for him.

“I thought about that before, and I think it’s good to change it up a bit,” he explains. “I think you can get lackluster training with the same guys, even if there are guys coming in from different gyms because quite often you kinda see the same faces and you know what the guy’s gonna do and he knows what you’re gonna do. What I’ve found is that you’ll find good guys almost everywhere that can really help your game. I definitely had fantastic training at the Skrap Pack in San Francisco (with Gilbert Melendez), but I have that out here as well, and I’ve got a bunch of guys coming through here that are great. They’re giving me good looks and advancing my game.”

Currently working with the Kline Brothers’ Easton BJJ school, as well as visiting training partners Rich Crunkilton and Josh Clopton, Wiman seems to have found a home in Colorado, and if his January win over Cole Miller was a harbinger of things to come for the Arvada resident, he may want to stick around a while.

“My wife and I like to move around a little bit, see different sights, and enjoy our freedom,” he said. “If we find a place where we feel like settling down, then we’ll do that, but I definitely like Colorado. Besides the scenery, the things to do, and the fun you can have here, the training partners that I’ve found have been super great tough guys and good human beings. My wife also has a great job here and it’s pretty awesome. I like training at high altitude and the weather’s beautiful.”

Any fighter will tell you that the more peace you have in your life outside the gym, the better you will perform inside it, as well as in competition. The Miller fight saw Wiman at his best, a bold statement considering his three Fight of the Night awards and six UFC wins leading up to the bout. But against his TUF5 castmate, he was firing all cylinders, disciplined, yet fiery, aggressive, but still controlled. The unanimous decision win was his third in a row and his biggest to date, but he’s not about to say that it was his springboard into the big time.

“I’ve had good victories in the past too, and you just gotta stay focused and treat each fight like its own fight, that nothing matters and that this fight is everything,” he said. “The past is the past and this is for all the marbles.”

It may be. On the UFC 132 main card, Wiman will have a sizeable audience watching him work against Germany’s Siver, a fighter on a nice hot streak of his own, and with a fourth consecutive victory, he will have earned the right to throw his name into the discussion for a future title shot. It’s a possibility he isn’t even considering at the moment.

“I don’t really know or care where beating him puts me,” he said. “I just want to beat him, and if I just keep being the best fighter that I can be, and keep stepping forward, then I’ve accomplished my goals, and that’s the plan. If I can say that I’m the best fighter that I can possibly be, overcame challenge after challenge, and stepped forward and persevered, then I’m happy.”

Has the 27-year old ever strayed from this approach to fights, where the natural inclination is to say ‘well, if I beat this guy then I get this one,’ etc, etc?

“I don’t think I’ve even overlooked an opponent or ever looked forward,” he said. “At the same time, I try not to overly respect my opponent and build him up into this monster because I need to do my thing, and when I do my thing, it doesn’t matter. I think I’m a better fighter than Siver, and if he fights my best and I fight my best, I’m gonna win.”

He does have plenty of respect for Siver though, both personally and professionally.

“When I look at Siver, I see a guy who came into his own and who is right now the best fighter that he’s ever been,” said Wiman. “I’m glad about that because I want to fight the best guys and I want to fight them when they’re at their best. There’s no point fighting someone while they’re down and out or up and coming and tough and nobody knows or cares who they are. You want to take that challenge and overcome it. Beating him now is huge. He’s a great fighter and I’m a fan of his. I spoke to him a couple times and he seems like a really nice guy. It’s sad that one of us has to lose, but it’s definitely not gonna be me. It’s not even an option.”

As for the fight itself, with Wiman and Siver combining to win post-fight bonus checks in 33% of their UFC bouts, the odds are good that there will be some fireworks come July 2nd.  Wiman is not about to dispute that assertion either, even though the bulk of the UFC 132 attention has gone to the top three fights on the bill – Dominick Cruz vs. Urijah Faber, Wanderlei Silva vs. Chris Leben, and Tito Ortiz vs. Ryan Bader.
 
“When I think of me and Siver, I think of co-main event,” he smiles. “It’s gonna get nuts. But I guess to the rest of the world, I guess it’s just a regular good fight, and that’s okay, I’ve been in that position before. Me and Sam Stout, we were actually marked as the first fight on the undercard (at UFC 97 in 2009) and it didn’t seem like too many people cared about our fight, and that was Fight of the Night. And they actually moved us and we fought after Chuck Liddell (vs. “Shogun” Rua) and right before Anderson Silva and Thales Leites. But I’m happy to be on the main card and people are gonna see a great fight.”

He does know that the attention focused on him will amp up even more if he wins, but if it doesn’t, he’s cool with that as well.

“It keeps you humble and it keeps you focused and more like a person than a celebrity,” he said. “I think it’s cool like this. I like being a wildcard, almost under the radar.”

Can he do it forever though?

“Maybe I can, maybe I can’t,” he laughs. “Who knows?”

 

All it took was one answer to see where Ryan Bader’s head was at after the first loss of his pro MMA career against Jon Jones in February. The question was a simple one; ask him when he started to get itchy to get back into the Octagon and put the defeat behind him.

“A week,” he responded, and he meant it. If UFC matchmaker Joe Silva called the former Arizona State University wrestling standout if he was available for any of the organization’s March shows, he was ready to go.

That’s a true competitor, and while his years of wrestling taught him that when you’re in there against the best night in and night out a loss is inevitable, it doesn’t make dealing with one any easier.

“It bothered me for a good week and I couldn’t stop thinking about it, mainly because I felt like I didn’t show up and fight,” said Bader of his second round submission loss to the man who now owns the light heavyweight title. “But that’s in the past. It was a bad night, I felt like I didn’t show up, and that happens in your career. I’ve had enough competition in my life to know that sometimes it’s a combination of that guy’s great, and sometimes you don’t show up either. So I put that in the past a long time ago and I reversed it and used it as fuel for the fire to get back in training, learn, and keep doing what I’ve been doing as far as my mentality to put the work in and get the results.”

Does it help at all that Jones went on to beat “Shogun” Rua for the title six weeks later?

“Watching him go out there and destroy Shogun, it doesn’t make you feel better, but it doesn’t make you feel any worse,” he laughs. “You’ve got to just erase it from your memory and start over, and I did. It happens, it’s competition.”

With that first loss done and out of the way, it was time for Bader to get back to the gym and start looking forward again. Despite winning The Ultimate Fighter season eight title and roaring out to four more UFC wins, including victories over Keith Jardine and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Bader wanted a big fight but probably expected one that wasn’t as high profile. He got the big fight, third on the UFC 132 bill this Saturday night in Las Vegas against former light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz. For “Darth” Bader, you can’t get much bigger than that.

“I’m a fighter and I’m also an MMA fan,” said the 28-year old. “I grew up watching Tito Ortiz, Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture and all those guys, and I’m taking this fight very seriously. A win over Tito is great for my career and getting back on the winning track. But it’s also a personal thing for me as far as fighting somebody like that. Being a fan of the sport and being in the same Octagon as a guy like Tito, who paved the way and has been a champion, and to have that name under my belt, it’s an honor. I’m looking forward to it. He’s coming off a few losses, but by no means am I underestimating him at all.”

And that’s the catch. Ortiz still has the name and the reputation, but in recent years, he hasn’t been the unstoppable “Huntington Beach Bad Boy” that he was in his prime. Bader remembers the Ortiz who, in many ways, paved the road for today’s fighters.
 
“He was a brash guy, in your face, and at that time, he was doing it perfectly because he was backing it up, smashing people and defending his belt,” said Bader. “He had the personality and the charisma, and he was the whole package when he was out there winning when he was the champion. But for me, I’m not fighting Tito Ortiz or his past opponents or anything like that; it’s just another opponent standing on the other side of the Octagon. Later on, I can look back and see Tito Ortiz’ name in my win column, but now it’s just another guy, another opponent.”

That mentality comes from his years on the mat, where you could very often be wrestling someone who had a huge name on the national scene or who you had looked up to as one of the best in the sport. Needless to say, as a two-time All-American and a three-time Pac-10 champion, Bader found the formula to reduce opponents to just that – opponents. No names, no faces, no reputations. In MMA, he did the same thing with Jardine and Nogueira, both of whom dwarfed him in experience. Now he has to do it against Ortiz.

“You can’t put people on a pedestal and say ‘Oh man, I’m fighting Tito Ortiz or Chuck Liddell,’” he said. “You just have to break it down to another opponent, another man. You have to get your training in, train hard and at the end of the day you’re just gonna fight another opponent in the Octagon. You can’t look at their names and you can’t look at who they beat or what accolades they have. Then you lose sight of what got you there.”

What got Bader to this point is a dominant wrestling game enhanced with fight-ending power in his fists, and he’s worked that game to perfection in all but one pro fight. Ortiz never had the one-punch power that Bader has, but when it comes to ground and pound, the 36-year old is a master. And Bader has done his homework on his foe, well aware that 0-4-1 record since his last win against Ken Shamrock in 2006 is deceptive. So for all the comments being made that the Arizonan is going to walk over the aging former champ, Bader is not taking him lightly.

“Tito is still a tough, tough fight,” he said. “People are expecting me to go out there and just walk through him, when they don’t know that he’s only lost to top five type guys. I’m not looking at his last four losses. I’m looking at him like this guy is gonna come out here and try to take me out, and I’m gonna do the same against him.”

Just another fight. That’s the way Ryan Bader is approaching it, and when the bell rings, it will be. But before and after, what may be odd for him is that despite being one of the game’s good guys, he could get booed for fighting a fighter who has become a sentimental favorite in recent weeks. But if Bader is the one forced to be the victor in Tito Ortiz’ last stand, so be it. It’s just business.

“Love him or hate him, he has done a lot for the sport and the fans know that too,” said Bader. “So at the end of the night, if it is his last night in the Octagon fighting for the UFC, I could definitely play that role (as the bad guy). But it doesn’t matter to me. I’ve got a job to do, and my job is to go out there to win. It’s about me going out there and looking my best. I want to get better every time I go out there, and I’m also coming off a loss. I want to erase that loss from everybody’s mind and look a ton better.”

 

After review from the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission, lightweight prospect Charles Oliveira’s submission win over Nik Lentz on June 26 in Pittsburgh has been overturned and ruled a no contest.

The revised verdict stems from an illegal knee thrown to the head and landed by Oliveira while Lentz had both knees on the mat, in direct violation of the unified rules of mixed martial arts. Referee Chip Snider did not call the foul, but replays clearly showed it, leading to the PSAC’s decision to review the bout.