Helgen närmar sig med storsteg och likaså UFC Fight Night 59. På plats finns vår amerikanske korrespondent Derek Bergey som de kommande dagarna kommer ge er insyn och intervjuer direkt på plats. Idag får vi bland annat höra om fansens mottagandet av Dennis Siver, vem som inte är rädd för att sätta journalister på plats och vem som ger järnet under open workout. Läs Dereks rapport här nedanför.
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Good evening from Boston, MMA NYTT’ERS. I don’t know how to pluralize Nytt, to be honest my best guess is that the world translates in English to “new”, so I guess I’m saying, good evening “Newers!” (Not a word) either way, this is Derek and I wanted to update you on what you missed today and what’s happened thus far in the UFC open workouts.
The first to arrive to the at the UFC Gym in Boston was Dennis Siver. The crowd of fans (all there to see Conor McGregor as Boston has a HUGE Irish base) started shouting his name as Siver walked through the door. Dennis however had his head down and stormed past them concentrating on the task at hand. I overheard one of the people in the crowd saying that he didn’t even look in their direction so he must be a jerk. I politely went over to the crowd and told them, the dude is German, that’s how they are man, they are head down, task at hand and don’t let anything get in the way of the goal. I, of course thought that would lead to a conversation with them and we could laugh about how German’s tinker with things, instead someone shouted, well he is going to get his ass kicked. I shrugged, as I’m not allowed to agree or disagree with people since I’m in the media, but I’ll say Dennis didn’t make any new fans with his pad work. It consisted mostly of jabbing and slipping out of the way then throwing another jab. That was essentially the bulk of it. He did a few spinning back kicks and then at the end smiled and said thank you and existed the cage. Again, he’s German so I get it and perhaps people reading this who know Germans understand what I’m saying, but I have to say he tried to be polite and that’s good enough considering where he comes from. (not all Germans are like that, but you head north, yesh, they don’t even smile) While talking, he answered questions through an interpreter despite the fact that he can speak some English and my thoughts of him were, first, he is shorter than I thought he’d be and I’m curious how someone who is not known for their grappling skills got cauliflower ear. But, he was friendly enough, tentative to answer questions and most of the questions that came his way were in essence, plain stupid. Most were asking him if he liked being trashed talked to, does he feel overlooked and does he get a title shot if he wins. All in all, he did well in front of the cameras but it wasn’t until the end that I thought, now there is a reaction. He smiled and said he will beat McGregor, I don’t know if a person should read into that or not, but it was a strange statement. Done in English by the way.
Next was Benson Henderson, Benson is no stranger to the crowd so his warm up was him talking and telling jokes with them. Posing for pictures and of all the people to bring into the cage with him for pad work was none other than Joe Riggs. Benson claims Riggs is the next champ and promises such, I imagine if they are working out together he believes that, as everyone who has ever worked out with Riggs swears he is the greatest fighter ever, then fight times comes and he has his ups and down. My thoughts with Benson are always the same, first, he’s not super tall either (I’m short by the way, 5’7-5’8”) and he seemed shorter than me, but every time I see him I think, good lord are his legs huge and how is it possible for a man to have that thin of a waist. He is, in technical terms, built strangely, like a cartoon super hero. But his jab on the mitts was crisp, he was throwing nice and relaxed combinations and everything was hard. Extremely, extremely hard shots. Joe Riggs has asked before they started the workout ”Should I wrap up my hands?”, and Henderson just nodded. I’ve held mitts for people a million times and have never wrapped my hands for it. But then again I’ve never held mitts for Benson Henderson. When it came to the questions Henderson is a to the point, direct guy and why some people might think he is stand offish, he isn’t. He ask you to your face, who’s next with a question, what’s your question and then if you ask something someone else had already ask, he points to that person and tells you, that person just asked that. This of course is fantastic for me because usually people all ask the same three questions eight times. I believe Benson has been in the game long enough and is generally an intelligent enough person that he can answer all the questions asked and, sell all the fights he’s been in. And he is such a competitor in the ring, on the matt and in conversation that he is not going to let someone else dictate or dominate what they want to hear come out of his mouth no matter how hard they try to manipulate it. He is more than happy to tell you when you’re wrong on something and doesn’t let you mince his words. I respect that about him. Benson is calm as always, good to the fans, talks up his friends and just comes to compete, once the interview was done,
I wish I were making this up, he was walking away to talk to someone and in walks Donald Cerrone wearing camouflage pants and a camouflage coat and a hat that the cartoon character Elmer Fudd wore, the kind with the fuzzy ear flap things that dangle down. Right when Benson was trying to seriously discuss his keys to victory Cowboy walks up in his hat and gives him a hug. They talked for a few seconds like old friends that have seen war together, because in reality they are old friends who have seen war together. Then Cowboy took off his camouflage outfit and underneath them were tights, that were also camouflage and he had on an orange T-shirt for a company that makes oil filters for cars. That’s what he wore to the cage. Let me say this now and I will stand by this until I die, Donald Cerrone is an absolute beast. He’s tall and lengthy and does everything hard and in kill mode. He didn’t get in the cage and warm up, he got in the cage like it were a bar fight. He didn’t bother to stretch he said very little he just got in the cage with a pad holder and got into a fall down drag out peck and paw melee like it were his worst enemy.
For those who don’t know, most media workouts are very boring, an elite level fighter gets in the cage and throws combo’s that people are doing on their forth day at a cardio kickboxing class. Most the fighters are dieting and it’s killing them, so the idea of working out more than they have to isn’t high on their list of things to do, understandably so. It’s usually pretty tough to watch as you know they are high performance athletes throwing a jab cross combo, and the guy in the cage with them is throwing the same weak stuff. Maybe the pads make a nice slap but by and large you are never impressed by someone jabbing a pad. Cowboy doesn’t do that. Cowboy got into the cage with his teammate and got into an actual fight, he was throwing hard fast shots the pad holder was swinging back wildly sometimes getting through with his shots and punching Cowboy in the head after that Cowboy would chase the guy down throwing punch combinations and kicks and knees that would kill all 5 of the last remaining African white rhino’s if they were in his path of destruction. Donald´s combos weren’t perfect because they weren’t planned and his attacks were not holding anything back. The guy is pouring sweat and it’s flying everywhere. It was an absolute war, every three or so minutes he would take a walk around the cage to wipe sweat and catch his breath and then he would go right back straight into kill mode. Hearing him talk he can’t escape his window of opportunity to tell you that he loves to fight. And he loves to feel that rush that comes with a fight. He seeks out that feeling of being nervous and afraid, that dangerous feeling you get in your stomach. That’s the way he likes to live, which is the thing that most everyone else on earth wants to avoid. Again, that dude is a beast. Only one person has ever wanted to fight as much as him when they make as much as him, Chuck Liddell.
Lastly to come to the workout was Conor McGregor, it’s no secret that everyone was there to see him and what they got was a rare display that usually only a yoga master is capable of. First, Conor McGregor is HUGE! He’s bigger than Henderson and Cowboy and he’s cutting weight, he is a big, long dude. His limbs are freakishly long and we got to watch him warm up for at least 20 minutes before he even touched the pads. The thing about Conor people don’t realize, is how in absolute control he is of his body, he is in essence a yoga master. His flexibility and the way he uses his legs it’s like watching a Kung-fu demonstration. He kicks a leg straight out parallel to the floor and he holds it there while he talks. He then wiggles and waddles around the cage like he were in a yoga class. Did he think it looked boring? Did he care? My guess to both of those would be no, he goes into a tunnel vision and just focuses on himself. He starts doing hand stands and then hand stand push ups. The whole thing takes awhile but while doing it and looking at his body you start to think, this guy could have been a gymnast. And Olympic level gymnast he is a GSP like athlete with a Jon Jones physic. He’s extremely limber in that ”I can bend over and fold my body in half kind of way”. Hitting the pads, he is relaxed and remarkably fast, his grappling was sharp and while his friend may or may not have given up the choke, Conor didn’t wait around during the grappling exchange, he defended a take down and zipped to the back, doubled legged the guy and went for the choke, I think he did it to let us know he could.
I think, with him, he is more capable of a martial artist than we thought we knew. He’s not just a knockout fighter, that guy is a yoga master kung-fu, athlete extraordinaire. That has a team that is solely there for him, to make sure he is ready, to make sure he is happy. That’s the kind of team you need around you at a high level. During the interview he was friendly with everyone and didn’t say anything out of the norm. He’s far more intelligent and way less boisterous then people give him credit for. His only jab at his opponent was that Siver was a cheater and he was going to beat him. But at the end of the day, while I might not have been that impressed with him any other time before this, seeing him in person and seeing him move is way different than you expect it to be.
