For Tito Ortiz, the hard part is done. Now it’s time to have fun.
Since the last time he appeared in the Octagon 18 months ago he’s had to deal with a complete falling out with the UFC and Dana White, not being able to do what he loves and compete, deal with a back injury that kept him from training and rehab following surgery that got so bad at times it had him in tears.
Even the decision whether to have back surgery was a tough one. After he opted for it, after the first few weeks, he feared he might have made the wrong choice he was in so much pain. But after a few months, it became clear he made the right one.
In fact, he felt so much better he thinks he pushed himself too hard in the first six months of rehab. Then something happened to slow him down.
“I had my appendix taken out and I think was pressing a little too hard in rehab because I think God kind of struck me down a little bit and made me get my appendix taken out,” Ortiz said on a recent conference call. “(Afterward) it took about a month even to get out of bed. But I bounced back quick.”
Ortiz, who is on a three-fight losing streak, believes he’s finally 100 per cent for a fight. It’s been a long time since he’s been able to say that.
Then there’s the Dana issue. The well-documented Dana issue. That may have been the toughest thing of all to overcome.
On one of his ridiculously many media appearances leading up to Saturday’s UFC 106, Ortiz spoke on the Jim Rome radio show. The always blunt Rome asked him who won the battle between him and White. Ortiz didn’t hesitate to declare himself the victor. Why? Because now fighters are being paid closer to what they deserve.
Yet Ortiz says it’s not even about the money. In fact, he left some money on the table to come back to the UFC, instead of signing with one of the other organizations such as Strikeforce, or Affliction, before it went under.
See for him, the battle with White was always about the old R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Respect for him, who had done so much to establish MMA and the UFC in particular, but also for the average fighter, who lays his body as much on the line as the superstars do.
His persona may have been, and may still be, about the “Bad Boy.” But he is nothing like that when you get to talk to him.
He made a point during his appearance on Rome that was worth remembering. Fighters don’t get paid for what they do on fight night. They get paid for the nine months before that. All the training and hard work and blood and sweat that goes into preparing to put on the best show they possibly can.
It’s their day job, and it’s not without its bruises. A black eye Ortiz was sporting at the weigh-ins can attest to that. This came as a result of a head butt on the last day of training before he came to Las Vegas but it shouldn’t pose any issue whatsoever for Ortiz, who weighed in at 204 pounds. (Griffin was 205 and all fighters made weight, including Anthony Johnson, who was six pounds over last time but actually one pound less than his opponent Josh Koscheck this time — 170 vs. 171.)
“I really want to press this fight as much as possible,” Ortiz said. “And it’s going to be 15 minutes of my life that I’m going to give 100 per cent. And when I step in the cage you know people are going to realize that Tito Ortiz is back.”
I sat down with Ortiz myself when he was a guest host for MMA Connected a couple of months ago. I also read his autobiography, and from the way he claims White has wronged him in the past, I wonder how he could have ever come to a point where he can say he’s forgiven and forgotten. (I’m not taking sides, I’m just saying the things Ortiz claims White did would be tough to get past.)
So I asked him how he did, and this is what he had to say:
“It was just one of those things, where you think life’s too short, why hate? I think he said the same thing too. I want to get the best fights in front of me … me and Dana came to a conclusion it needs to happen in the UFC and they gave me an offer I couldn’t refuse. It’s nice to be around a positive environment in the UFC.
“I think one of the hardest things (to forgive) was when they had the first Hall of Fame and they didn’t invite me. They inducted all these other guys, and that’s fine, that’s cool, my career’s not done, I don’t want to be inducted yet, but just invite me to the event when it happens. I helped them pave the way to what the company is, and I was just looking for that respect. But now, like I said it’s all behind us and brushed under the mat. Let’s restart, let’s do this stuff over again the right way.
“I think Dana grew up a little bit. I don’t think he’s the same guy he was before, the cocky (guy.) He’s grown up a lot as a business owner and as a promoter. I think he takes care of the fighters a lot better now, and a lot more fighters have seen it.”
Ortiz believes his fight career has come full circle, and the final chapter of his journey starts Saturday night at UFC 106. He also believes he wouldn’t have been able to get through all the hard work that’s got him here without a little faith in something beyond himself.
“I know for a fact someone up there’s watching over me,” Ortiz told me. “Times I should have been dead, or (when I was young) end up going to prison for 20-25 years. I should have been that kid. … I think with the hard work I’ve put (in) it makes life a little easier, but everything has been happening for a reason.
“When I became a world champion I made a bet with myself, kind of a destiny for myself, that if I don’t lie, I don’t cheat, I don’t steal and be honest with everybody around me, make sure I help society in one way or another, (it) will repay me somehow. And I’m being repaid and I have. I have two beautiful sons. I have a beautiful girlfriend. A beautiful house. I have a beautiful son Jacob from my ex-wife. There has to be an angel on my shoulder.”