Anthony Pettis has overcome the “mental block” that has affected him recently.
Once-upon-a-time Pettis was sitting on top of the mixed martial arts (MMA) world. He reigned as the UFC’s lightweight champion in the midst of a five-fight win streak. Unfortunately for “Showtime,” that came crashing down when he went up against Rafael dos Anjos.
“RDA” dethroned Pettis in dominant fashion back in March of 2015. The Brazilian put on a dominant five round thrashing of Pettis en-route to a lightweight title win. After the loss, Pettis went on to lose two more.
He has had a very up-and-down record in the past three years. Pettis recently told Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show that his defeat to dos Anjos was a rude awakening (quotes via ESPN):
“RDA was the better man that night. I finally admitted it to myself,” Pettis said. “I was on top of the world and then that happens to you. I’ve never even been hit in any of my fights, basically. Then the RDA fight happens and you have to readjust.”
As for Pettis’ rollercoaster of a career following his loss to “RDA,” the 31-year-old explained he was dealing with a “mental block” he couldn’t get past:
”It’s a mental block. You know what happened and want to get past it, but you also know how good you are and it’s a battle in your own head that you had to figure out.”
Pettis really looked like “Showtime” in his last outing. He submitted jiu-jitsu specialist Michael Chiesa in the second round of their UFC 226 fight in July. That performance did enough to earn him a fight with returning former interim lightweight champion Tony Ferguson.
They will meet on the main card of what could be the biggest MMA event of all time – UFC 229. The action goes down on October 6th in Las Vegas and is main evented by Khabib Nurmagomedov vs. Conor McGregor for the lightweight title:
“I love it,” Pettis said. “I think he has a great fighting style. He’s one of the guys who comes and brings it. I’m excited to get in there with a guy like that. He’s going to try to finish the fight, and that’s what I’m trying to do the whole time.”
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