The beloved Anthony Smith is seemingly feeling a bit underappreciated as evidenced by his recent comments toward MMA fans and the sport in general.
‘Lionheart’ is a veteran of the sport and is known for his extreme toughness, versatility, and fight IQ. Currently, on a 0-2 skid, this is immediately following his impressive 3-0 streak against the likes of Devin Clark, Jimmy Crute, and Ryan Spann. Back-to-back losses at the hands of Magomed Ankalaev and Johnny Walker surely haven’t helped with his morale, and now, Smith has leveled with the community and said some very sad but very accurate things.
It does put into question where Smith is mentally. In his last fight against Walker at UFC on ABC 4, cameras picked up ‘Lionheart’ telling his opponent: “You’re attacking my family.” Which, is pretty bizarre to say and could be misconstrued in several different ways. Maybe Smith was setting a mental scenario forth where he was defending his family against an attacker, or, maybe he was referencing something that was said behind the scenes, in the cage, or on social media. The true answer, nobody really knows.
It is worth saying that Anthony Smith did in fact have to protect his family against a home invasion years ago. The experience was no doubt very scary and could have even left the UFC fighter with PTSD. Luckily, ‘Lionheart’ was a trained martial artist, and the home invader was beaten to a bloody pulp and will probably think twice before invading homes again.
Anthony Smith talks about MMA fans and describes the hate he receives from them
Appearing on MMA Fighting’s, The MMA Hour, Smith opened up about his relationship with fans and described how in his opinion, support seemed to be at an all-time low.
“The more popular I get, the more I hate it, to be honest with you,” Smith told Ariel Helwani (H/T BJPenn.com). “Maybe popular is the wrong word. The more, maybe, recognizable?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know how to state it,” Anthony Smith continued. “It’s just, everyone outside of this whole circus show makes it really miserable for the people inside of it. Maybe I’m one of the few guys that will be honest about that. The fans used to be the thing that drove you. They’d push you through and they would support you. And once you get to a certain level, then they hate you.”
“It sucks. It sucks because you get s*** on way more the higher up you grow in this sport,” Anthony Smith finished. While the tone of this is very depressing, it’s undoubtedly true. MMA fans are known for being very toxic and obnoxious at times, and there’s no doubt that Smith has probably received hate mail online and in real life many times.
While a lot of these so-called “fans” might want to hate on him, we can only hope that Anthony Smith will one day feel the love that the majority of the community undoubtedly feels for him.
What do you think about Anthony Smith’s comments?