http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=news.detail&gid=3064
08/15/2006
Diego Sanchez Won’t Let the “0” Go
By Thomas Gerbasi
In combat sports, everybody eventually loses. Unless you’re Rocky Marciano in boxing, nobody gets out of these sports at their highest levels without sampling the bitter taste of defeat.
In that respect, the last 12 months has been particularly hard on the members of the first season cast of The Ultimate Fighter, with Forrest Griffin, Sam Hoger, Stephan Bonnar, Josh Koscheck, Nate Quarry, Alex Karalexis, and Chris Leben all getting losses pinned on their records in their post-TUF finale UFC careers.
In some ways, that’s to be expected as young fighters take that leap from the smaller shows of the sport to the UFC and a higher level of competition, and when some lose, like Griffin to Tito Ortiz in one of the best fights of 2006, or Koscheck to Drew Fickett in the final seconds of a fight he was winning throughout, the defeats are quickly dismissed and chalked up as learning experiences. In fact,
UFC welterweight champ Matt Hughes may have put it best when he said “If you’re undefeated, then you’re not fighting the right people.”
From that first season of TUF, the only fighters who remain unbeaten in the Octagon are Mike Swick, Kenny Florian, and Diego Sanchez and both Swick and Florian have suffered defeats in their pre-UFC careers (with Florian also losing to Sanchez in the TUF1 finale). So Sanchez stands alone, his record unblemished and with a neon target on his back that his peers in the 170-pound division would love to get a shot at. Brian Gassaway, Nick Diaz, and John Alessio have already failed. Karo Parisyan gets his chance on Thursday in the main event of UFC Fight Night. In some ways, Sanchez is carrying the flag as one of the last TUF 1 men standing.
“I guess so,” says Sanchez,
“but in my mind all the TUF guys are gonna lose and I’m gonna be the only undefeated fighter and I’m still gonna be the only guy that went through the show, finished everybody, and I’m gonna be ‘The Ultimate Fighter.’ They’re gonna say, ‘that guy Diego Sanchez, he was ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ through all the seasons.’ They’re gonna say that he was the only guy that dominated it, came out after it, stayed undefeated, won the belt, and got out of his contract undefeated.”
It’s a bold statement, but that’s the way Sanchez does it. Just 24 years old, the Albuquerque, New Mexico native has the confidence that goes with being that age and seemingly invincible and the talent that goes hand in hand with a 17-0 record. But his comments aren’t laced with bravado or loud proclamations. He speaks softly in a matter of fact fashion as if what he’s saying isn’t a hope or a dream, but a future reality.
“Really all it is is a mental state, a way of thinking, and it’s a way of believing in yourself,” he explains. “I believe in myself, and if I didn’t, I wouldn’t be doing this. Anyone can do anything if they believe and I’m trying to get that message across. Everybody wants to hate and everybody wants to doubt, and there are people out there who want to see me lose just to see me lose, and they think I’m cocky, but I believe in myself. If you want to hate me because of that, go ahead. If I didn’t believe, there would be times in fights where I’d be like, ‘okay, I can quit, I’m tired,’ but I feel I’ve got a lot a heart, and though people say every dog has its day and everybody has his time to lose, maybe that’s true but I’m trying my best to take fights smart and fight smart and do my best to keep my record undefeated. When I started this game a long time ago, I told myself I’m gonna be smart about it.
I’m not just gonna go in there and be (former UFC contender) Robbie Lawler and say “ARRRGGGGGH, I’m gonna brawl and try to knock your head off and try to be the most exciting fighter in MMA history.” That’s not my gameplan. My gameplan is to be smart, and that means there may be some boring fights, but other fights are gonna be damn exciting, and I’m always gonna push the pace and do what I can to win.”
It’s this confidence that has gained Sanchez a score of internet detractors, but also a legion of fans that follow his every move. The President of White Chocolate Management, Reed Wallace, immediately saw how Sanchez appealed to the masses.
“Diego is a very special soul,” said Wallace, who handles the career of ‘The Nightmare’. “His charm and personality, coupled with his drive and desire, was what attracted us to him. I believe his enthusiasm and dedication to being a winner is what sets him apart from the rest. He has all the qualities of a champion.”
A championship shot at Hughes may come sooner rather than later for Sanchez if he gets by Parisyan, but that’s far from a gimme, as ‘The Heat’ has long been one of the more underrated fighters in the game, a standout judo player whose only loss in six UFC starts was via decision to number one contender Georges St. Pierre in 2004. In fact, Parisyan was scheduled to challenge Hughes for the welterweight belt last November before a torn hamstring forced him out of the bout.
He’s no joke, and Sanchez knows it.
“I definitely think he is my toughest opponent,” said Sanchez. “I’ve always known that styles make fights, and ever since I got off the Ultimate Fighter show, I wanted to fight Karo Parisyan.
I’ve always known my wrestling was better than his, and he ain’t gonna take me down with that judo crap, and I can outstrike him. I’ve been waiting a long time to get a knockout on my record, but I’ve been playing it smart. I’m not just gonna go in and stand in there with someone if I’m better than them on the ground.”
In this particular bout, the risk will be commensurate to the reward he will get for winning it. You beat someone like Parisyan, and do it impressively, even the doubters will have to grudgingly give you your respect. And though Sanchez tries not to let his poker face slip, you can tell that he wants to silence his skeptics.
“Karo Parisyan is a tough guy, and I think this is gonna shut up a lot of the doubters and the negative people out there who say I don’t have no standup and this or that,” he said. I get a lot of criticism, but I get a lot of love too, so this is gonna win over a bunch of those skeptic fans. With every fight I get more and more respect, and I think if I can go in there and finish Karo in the first round, that will be something that ain’t been done before – not by St. Pierre or anyone. Everybody’s on the St. Pierre and Hughes bandwagon, so if I go in there and do that, that will be put me right in title contention.”
He’s got a long night ahead of him first, and it follows two other long nights with Diaz and Alessio that produced vastly different reactions. In beating Diaz last November, Sanchez proved that he was for real as he and the Californian put on a dazzling display of groundwork that saw Sanchez emerge with a well-deserved three round unanimous decision. But against Alessio in May, fight fans saw Sanchez get nullified offensively until a third round surge allowed him to pull away with the decision win.
“I’m not gonna make any excuses, but a lot of things went bad for me in training camp for that fight,” he admits. “I really didn’t get to do any sparring, wrestling, or MMA training. I just hit mitts, and that was it for the fight. But I knew if I got him to the ground I was gonna be that much better than him there, and I truly was in the best shape of my life for that fight, and I trained so hard that no matter what, I expected that my shots were gonna be more explosive and my punches and attacks were going to be quicker, but things didn’t go my way. I got cut nine days before the fight, hid it from everybody, didn’t tell anybody, got stitches from a private doctor, and still went in there and fought. But the cut reopened, I threw my back out, and everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong.”
Not that Alessio’s safety-first gameplan endeared him to Sanchez either.
“I was ready to show the people out there that I was confident in my standup, but he just wanted to play a game where his gameplan was to cut me and get the fight stopped,” claims Sanchez. “In my opinion, that’s a @%@&$ gameplan. I don’t know any other way to say it.
If you want to win just by cutting somebody and running away all night, you’re a @$&$ in my eyes. You say you’re a standup fighter, you say you fight like Chuck Liddell, sprawl and brawl, let’s brawl – try to knock me out at least. The one time that he tried to step in and attack, I took him down and took his back and rode him out for the rest of the round. He may have thrown just one or two right hands the whole fight.”
The fight is obviously still a sore point for Sanchez, who lost the opportunity to put on an impressive show against a sturdy veteran on a big stage in Los Angeles, but on the positive side of things, he had a night where he admitted that everything went wrong, and he still got the ‘W’. That’s got to be encouraging.
“I learned more in that fight than all my other fights put together,” he said. “I really had to suck it up, and when my back went out in the first round, I really had to suck it up. I knew that if I let it affect me, he was gonna take advantage of it, so I tried to act like nothing happened. I couldn’t really twist with my punches or follow through, and with my takedowns I couldn’t lift or be as explosive as I wanted to be, but I learned a lot from it, and if John Alessio puts together a winning streak that’s worthy of another fight, I would love to get in there and have a fight with him where he fights back. If we’re gonna do this, fight me at least.”
The more troubling downside to the Alessio fight though, is that it may have given Parisyan and other future foes the blueprint on how to nullify Sanchez’ offensive game.
“Study me, watch all the tape you want, think what you want, I’m telling you what I’m gonna do and I’m gonna go in there and do it,” Sanchez fires back.
“You’re not gonna take me down. I’m gonna stand up if you take me down, and if I have to work for submissions and sweeps, I’ll do that too. I’m gonna definitely be trying to knock him (Parisyan) out – I want to be the first one to knock him out, and I want to show the people that I’m able to do something that St. Pierre wasn’t able to do.”
He’s come a long way from his days as a King of The Cage standout and being the quirky kid on ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ show. That’s some year and a half for Sanchez.
“I’ve learned so much,” he said. “I’ve got these great coaches who have taught me a lot, and I’ve come so far. It’s been a challenge overcoming the sicknesses and the injuries, but I’ve traveled a lot and met a lot of people and it’s just been great. I’ve learned a lot and I’m ready to keep striving for that goal. But with one mistake it will be taken away from me.”
That may be exaggerating the point a bit, but maybe he needs that Doomsday scenario to get up in the morning, put in the work at Greg Jackson’s gym and continuously put himself on the line in the sport’s deepest division.
The legend goes that boxing icon Oscar De La Hoya always carried a food stamp in his wallet to remember where he came from. Sanchez may need to think that one loss will kill his career in order to motivate him. But one thing’s for sure – he’s not planning on getting that loss or going away anytime soon.
“I’m still hungry,” he said. “
I want to be the guy that takes Matt Hughes out. I want to be the guy that finishes him, and sends him home with a retirement bag. They think that’s rude and a bad thing to say, but that’s what I want to do. I want to be the guy that ends the reign and starts it over. If someone does that to me someday, then that’s my destiny, but I’m gonna be the guy that comes in and takes over this welterweight division and gets out of my contract undefeated – the Golden Boy of MMA. My dream is to take our sport to a level that’s never been reached. I want it to be as big as soccer worldwide, with stadiums full of people going crazy like they do for soccer.”
“I see that as a dream that can come true,” Sanchez continues. “But a lot of the negative people don’t want to see that happen because they just don’t want to see something good happen. They don’t believe it can happen. But I believe that I can go so far with this and I believe that I can change this sport, so I’m gonna try to do what I can do.”
