Tito Ortiz thinks his final UFC fight was fixed

[ads2]Former UFC light heavyweight champ and UFC Hall of Fame member Tito Ortiz has retired from active competition and is now managing fighters such as Invicta FC featherweight Cris Cyborg.

Ortiz last fought in July 2012 at UFC 148 where he lost a unanimous decision in a rubber match against Forrest Griffin. Ortiz did pick up a “Fight of the Night” bonus for his efforts, but in a new interview with German MMA site GnP.tv, Ortiz said short of him stopping Griffin via knockout or submission, he thinks the outcome of the fight was predetermined:

“My last fight didn’t turn out the way it was supposed to. I thought I won. All my fans thought I won. I thought I won the fight. When you drop a guy twice, you take a guy down four times, and you dominate by doing it. He never took me down, he never hurt me. Go back and watch the fight. For the first time in UFC history they showed ‘Strikes Attempted’. Not ‘Strikes Landed’, ‘Strikes Attempted’. When do you ever show somebody with ‘Strikes Attempted’? He never hit me, I blocked all of them. I checked all of his kicks. I listened to Joe Rogan [on the broadcast commentary] and it was like a one-sided fight that he was watching. I gave him sh*t on the phone one time because of it and when we did the podcast he kind of sidewinded around it and never got to those questions.”

“But [during the commentary] he said ‘Look at the leg kicks that Forrest is hitting him with’. I checked all of them! My shin, I had a chipped bone on the tip of it because I checked all of his kicks. I checked everything. And for the first time, like I said, in UFC history that they did for ‘Strikes Attempted’. He never hurt me. And I thought I won the fight, and after him running out of the fight, that shows that he lost. And then for Dana to go and run and get him to come back, there’s something fishy going on here. How does Dana know how the match is going to turn out? I thought something was fishy about that. Was it premeditated, was it pre-planned out what the answer was going to be? If I didn’t knock him out or I didn’t submit him, they already knew who was going to win.”

Those are BOLD accusations to make against a former employer who you still want to keep a working relationship with when it comes to negotiating bouts for your fighters.

Is this just sour grapes from Ortiz or do you think there’s some validity to his statements? During the same interview Ortiz also indicated he feels the UFC should set up some type of retirement fund for their Hall of Fame members:

“UFC are billionaires because of us. They weren’t billionaires, UFC was losing their ass. If it wasn’t for guys like myself, Couture, Liddell, Hughes, you go back to Royce Gracie, go back to Ken Shamrock, if it wasn’t for these guys they wouldn’t be billionaires. I got to give Anderson Silva some credit. I got to give Georges St-Pierre some credit. If it wasn’t for us going out and putting on a show, they wouldn’t be billionaires, so I think they should take care of us after our career is done. The guys who are in the [UFC] Hall of Fame, they need to find some type of retirement fund to take care of us so we have nothing to ever worry about because they’re billionaires because of us.”

Do you agree with Ortiz’s sentiments here? If you look at the guys Ortiz mentioned who have retired, in particular Chuck Liddell and Matt Hughes, they became huge stars for the UFC during the Zuffa era.

And not only that, but they remained “loyal” to the company, and because of that I think the UFC has set them up with a type of “retirement fund”. They both currently hold executive positions within the company where they receive a regular salary, and from all reports — including Dana White himself — not a whole lot is required of them.

Guys like Randy Couture and Tito Ortiz have had their much publicized issues with the UFC over the years, therefore, a “retirement fund” or executive position in the company probably isn’t going to happen. Is that fair? I don’t know. But it’s business.
[ads1]