(Riddle’s doctor described the injury as occurring “right about in the toadstool-area.” Photo via Sherdog)
After getting fired by the UFC for a second positive marijuana test and ensuring that he’d never be back inside the Octagon by insulting Dana White’s business acumen and bald head, Matt “Deep Waters” Riddle was preparing to transition to Bellator later this month in a welterweight tournament quarterfinal against Luis Melo Jr. But thanks to another training injury, that fight’s not going to happen, and the TUF 7 vet says he’s stepping away from the sport altogether. As he wrote on Facebook last night:
I’m retiring from MMA today cracked my rib and can’t fight sept 20, Bellator said they can’t find me a fight till the next tournament and I can’t afford not fighting that long and need a job, sorry if I let anyone down but it isn’t paying the bills
Injuries have haunted Riddle’s professional career, which was spent entirely in the UFC. (Like his fellow TUF 7 castmate Amir Sadollah, Riddle only had amateur experience when he tried out for The Ultimate Fighter.) During his five years in the Octagon, Riddle had to withdraw from four scheduled fights due to injury and was pulled off of UFC 141 just hours before the event due to illness.
Making a living as a low-to-mid-level UFC fighter is hard enough when you’re fighting consistently. But if we’re going to talk about lost wages, we have to mention the fines and suspensions that Riddle received from his two separate positive marijuana tests, which he caught following his victories over Chris Clements (which originally earned him Submission of the Night honors at UFC 149) and Che Mills. Both of those wins were overturned to no-contests, leaving Riddle with a lifetime record of 7-3 with 2 no-contests, which would have been a more respectable 9-3 if he didn’t smoke so much damn weed.
Riddle’s latest setback was the last straw for him financially, and he’ll now try to enter general population and get a non-fighting job. (A “regular, you know, job, job-type job,” as Mr. Blonde would say.) But enough doom and gloom. Let’s look at Matt Riddle’s achievements…
– He was the original Uriah Hall. Riddle’s knockout of Dan Simmler during the elimination round of TUF 7 was at the time considered to be the nastiest KO in Ultimate Fighter history, mostly because of the sounds Simmler was making afterwards.
– His 1,350 strikes landed in the UFC puts him at #8 on the all-time list, between Chael Sonnen (1,452) and Nate Diaz (1,343). Seriously. Matt Riddle of all people. And in terms of strikes attempted, my God, it has to be in the trillions.
– He once took first-place in a wrestling tournament that also included Jon Jones.
– He helped popularize the phrase “butter-toothed Brit.”
Good luck out there, Matt.