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Forrest Griffin sponsor BSN sent MMATorch a video featuring exclusive comments from Forrest Griffin on Anderson Silva, his running from the Octagon after his loss, and Tito Ortiz. The following are key quotes:
On the Anderson Silva loss: "Obviously people want to know what happened with the Anderson Silva fight. I don't know. It was pretty bad. Now, right now, today, this is the most motivated I've been. I'm genuinely, kind of like a fire your stomach, I don't know what the correct analogy is, I really want to punch someone in the face, I really want to win the fight.
On people calling him a coward for running from the Octagon after his last loss: "It's easy to criticize. It's easy to kind of stand on the sideline and criticize a person's blood, sweat, and toil. Anyone who says that, I feel bad for them because they've never given of themselves so much and cared about something so much that not getting it broke them. You know, those people have never truly lived, you know."
On facing Tito Ortiz: "I think Tito, I think he can still be a force. He was champion of the world at 21, 22, something crazy like that. A fight against Tito is obvioiusly something I want. I lost the lat one. I don't think either of us were at their best. Hopefully I've gotten a little better and he's gotten a little older... It's definitely a fight I know I can win."
On his inner-rage: "These feelings of anger that will get you imprisoned are definitely flowing through me now, so I need to fight somebody here relatively quickly."
Keller's Analysis: Forrest seemed more grounded here than when he joked (we hope) about being on Quaaludes in a previous post-Silva fight interview. Then again, he's talking about feelings of anger that could get him imprisoned, and I'm not entirely sure anyone write that off as just hype given how he's acted and talked lately. I'd still like to hear some introspective analysis of how good Silva was that night. He took a lot of heat for the way he ran from the cage after the Silva loss. Based on these comments, he obviously took the loss hard because he got beat so badly and, if nothing else, knew he was put against Silva to provide the fans a fast-paced, balls-out fight. Before this fight, if you told me the Griffin-Silva fight was going to go the way it did, here's what I'd have imagined Forrest saying:
"Hey, that fight was created because everyone wanted to see someone go out there and swing for the fences against Anderson. I did that. It obviously wasn't the smartest strategy, and if I fought him again, I wouldn't succumb to the pressure to leave myself so open and rush at him like that. I've never been hit that hard, so now I understand why previous opponents were so hesitant to exchange punches with him. Now, at least fans hopefully won't give the next guy who faces him a hard time for wanting to try to throw Anderson off his game rather than playing into the fans' desire to see a slugfest like Stephan Bonner and I had. Anderson is a special fighter and you need to fight totally different against him than I did to have any chance to win. I learned a lesson and hopefully taught the fans and the MMA world a lesson. Now I have to go back to the gym and up my game because I just got tested against the best."
[Forrest Griffin photo provided to MMATorch.com courtesy BSNONLINE.net]
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