(Photo via Getty.)
True to his word, Jamie Varner was more than holding his own against Drew Dober at UFC on FOX 13 last weekend until bad luck befell him. While attempting to slam Dober to the mat, Varner pulled a Maynard and unintentionally knocked himself out, only waking up to find himself in a fight-ending rear-naked choke.
It was a particularly tough loss for Varner, being his fourth in as many contests and coming in front of his hometown crowd, and one that signaled that perhaps the game had passed by the former WEC champ. So for the second time, Varner called it quits in his post-fight interview, stating that it was a decision he had been planning to make for some time.
In an interview with media members after the fight, Varner expanded upon his reasons for retiring, what the future holds for him, and perhaps most importantly, the idea of starting a fighter’s union. Check out the full interview below.
I would love to start some type of union for fighters. I mean, the sport is growing, and we’re getting all these big-time endorsement deals, and a lot of us – we’re just fighters. We don’t think about the next step.
I think it’s something that needs to happen. We are a mainstream, major sport now, and if you look at all the mainstream, major sports, they all have unions, and they have league minimums and some sort of retirement (plan) and all that kind of stuff. I think that’s something that needs to happen for fighters because this is one of those careers that when it’s over, a lot of these guys don’t have something else.
And just like that, Varner has likely been blacklisted.
I kid, but it is interesting to note how many fighters have felt comfortable discussing the potential of a fighter union in recent months, especially in light of the multi-million dollar lawsuit currently being filed against the UFC by some such fighters. Are the two directly related? Possibly, but it’s almost impossible to deny that the tide is starting to turn on the premiere organization in mixed martial arts. With guys like Brendan Schaub already coming forward to lament how badly the Reebok deal is screwing them over financially, it looks like the idea of a fighter union is starting to gain some steam. And it’s about f*cking time.
Of course, this raises the question: When all is said and done, will Wanderlei Silva be looked at as the man who brought the whole corrupted temple down?