Video: Fighter fakes heart attack to gain advantage, taps out when about to win

You won’t see many things more bizarre than this, even in a sport full of bizarre happenings.

Sometimes things are weird in MMA. That’s a given. Fighters have fallen out of cages. Referees have completely missed taps, or seen ones that didn’t actually happen. There’s always something new and wacky. And this definitely falls into that category.

MMA veterans Johnathan Ivey (41-57) took on Travis Fulton (256-54-10 – yes, you read that correctly) at Colosseum Combat 45 in Indiana for a regional title, and well….things got odd. Ivey ate a body kick, and looked to be briefly having a heart attack after taking the shot. He quickly came to life again, throwing a right and then barraging Fulton with punches that dropped him to the mat.

Okay, pretty strange so far. But it gets stranger.

Ivey opened up with a ton of punches on a prone Fulton, who was trying to cover up. This lasted for a while, until Ivey slowed down with his strikes. Then stopped. He stood up and backed off, allowing Fulton to return to his feet. Then he reached over and tapped the mat. He gave up.

The announcers speculate as to why he would do that – was he being nice? Did he gas out? Maybe only Ivey knows that for sure.

Anyway, here’s the video of the whole ordeal, via Caposa on Twitter.