Matt Mitrione: 'I don't like Alistair Overeem as a human being'
During an interview on the most recent The Fighter and the Kid podcast, UFC heavyweight Matt Mitrione sounded off on a host of topics, including his next opponent (Ben Rothwell), the Reebok deal, his animosity toward Alistair Overeem, what he feels is the most corrupt organization on Earth (the NCAA), as well as his favorite fighter of all time (Fedor Emelianenko). The former football player also discussed the ways he's tried to improve his game in preparation for his next fight, in June.
"All I do is wall-defense work," he told co-host Brendan Schaub, who exploited a grappling advantage against his friend when they fought in 2013.
Mitrione also revealed that he is in Southern California to work with former UFC heavyweight champ Josh Barnett, jokingly calling the experience with the expert submission grappler "miserable."
Mitrione went on to predict that, though Rothwell has confidence in his hands, he'll likely try to press him against the cage, take him down and make him carry his weight around. Should the fight end up on the ground, Mitrione sounds confident that, this time, he will be able to handle himself.
"I see [myself] touching him up, maybe knocking him down a little bit, and then taking a different angle," he said.
"If it goes to the ground, I feel like, with Rothwell, I should be able to show my ground game. ... Obviously, I'm a striker. If I can put my hands on you, I'm going to. But, if I get in a position where I'm going to grapple, I can get down."
Mitrione was less high on the UFC's recently announced exclusive apparel real with Reebok. Mitrione said that the details of the deal as it relates to fighters are completely unknown, except for the fact that he knows he's already lost a $30,000 sponsor for his next fight because of it.
"We, as people directly involved in it, have no clue what is going on," he said.
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"So, unfortunately, we have to pine for fights that we may or may not get, just because we need to move up in the rankings, to get paid. I'm losing a $30,000 sponsor ... and I don't even know if I'm going to make that much back in the UFC now."
The Reebok deal, which will supposedly base royalty pay-outs to athletes based on the UFC's unreliable rankings, is also why Mitrione said he recently called out the high-ranked Andrei Arlovski, with whom he has trained in the past.
"I like Arlovski, I met him a couple times," Mitrione said.
"If nothing else, I respect him."
Mitrione has also trained a bit with his upcoming opponent Rothwell, at Duke Roufus' Wisconsin gym. "We had some good sparring sessions," he said.
Though Mitrione never became friends with Rothwell, he did give him some advice before Rothwell took on Overeem. After training with the Dutchman at the Blackzilians camp in South Florida, Mitrione grew to greatly dislike the former K-1 champ.
"I just don't like Overeem. I'd like to see him lose," he said.
"I don't like him as a human being. ... He is a smug, arrogant man. He came to the Blackzilians and ostracized himself almost immediately.
Mitrione went on to detail several instances where he said Overeem acted selfishly and secretively around people who were supposed to be on his team. "He's such a prima donna that he really thinks that people care about what he does and how he does it," he said.
"He'd come in and work out at, like, 11:30 at night so nobody else could see what he was doing."
So, Mitrione decided to mess with Overeem's head, playing on what he said is Overeem's vanity and preoccupation with looking like a huge superhero.
"I told him, 'God, you look like you're losing weight, man,'" Mitrione remembered with a chuckle.
"'What's going on with you?' He'd be like, 'No, no, I'm 275.'"
Mitrione had nothing bad to say about another former Pride fighter, however, in long-time heavyweight champion Emelianenko. "He's just an animal," Mitrione said.
"Everything he does is flawless, man. His throws, his grappling. Everything he does. His hands. And how we, like, changes tempo, mid-strike. He's fearless."
Check out the rest of the excellent conversation with Mitrione, as well as the entire The Fighter and the Kid podcast above.
