After what we saw last night (Sat. July 8, 2017), it looks like “Showtime” is back.
Former UFC lightweight champion Anthony Pettis got back on the winning track at 155 pounds when he defeated veteran Jim Miller on the UFC 213 main card on pay-per-view (PPV). Since dropping his then-lightweight title to Rafael dos Anjos back in March of 2015, “Showtime” racked up a three fight losing streak before deciding to jump down to 145 pounds.
While his divisional debut against Charles Oliveira was a success, defeating him via third round submission, he failed to capitalize on that momentum by suffering a third round defeat to Max Holloway for the interim featherweight championship in a bout he missed weight for.
Now with his win over Miller, Pettis is feeling rejuvenated in his career and said the weight cut to 155 pounds went ‘amazing’ (quotes via MMA Fighting):
“Just the win in general feels amazing,” Pettis said. “To be back in the lightweight division, the weight cut was amazing. I didn’t have to kill myself. I got to train the whole camp. It just felt good.
“I felt this way when I went on my title run, when I beat (Joe) Lauzon, (Donald) Cerrone, (Benson) Henderson, all in the first round. I just felt confident in my skillset. I’ve worked really hard on my wrestling with Israel Martinez, and I wanted [Miller] to take a shot on me just to show I had that defense there. I had the range, I felt strong. I hurt my hand in like the second round, the same injury as the Holloway fight, so I stopped throwing that right hand, but everything else worked good.”
In his loss to Holloway, Pettis broke his hand, however, it did not require surgery to repair. After his scrap with Miller last night the former lightweight champ feels as though he might have broke it yet again:
“I broke [my right hand] in the (Max) Holloway fight, and it broke in a way that I didn’t need surgery, but we knew it could be broken again,” Pettis said. “So yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s broken, so I’ve got to take it to get x-rays and see what happens.”
After a weight cut to 145 pounds that felt like ‘death’ to Pettis, he finally feels at home again in the lightweight division as he can focus on training properly for a fight instead of just putting all his effort into cutting weight:
“One-forty-five was death,” Pettis said. “I was trying to make weight, I couldn’t even train, I was just cutting weight the whole time. This was — I felt at home again. I was just having fun and there was no pressure.
“Like in the (Charles) Oliveira fight, I was potentially fighting for a title shot. Max Holloway was the interim title. This one I had no pressure, just go out there and have fun, and that’s what I did. I went out there and had fun.”
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