Anthony Pettis Says He Was ‘Fat Dude’ At Featherweight

Anthony Pettis will make his welterweight debut against former title contender Stephen Thompson in the main event of tonight’s (Sat., March 23, 2019) UFC on ESPN+ 6 from the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee.

Former UFC champion ‘Showtime’ has finally ditched the draining weight cuts down to lightweight and even featherweight. He’s understandably feeling rejuvenated in doing so. Following an up-and-down run the past few years, Pettis is going the path many fighters have and ditching a huge cut. But there was a time shortly after he lost the 155-pound title that he thought dropping down to 145 pounds was a good idea.

Pettis opened up to MMA Fighting about how bad that was for his body. You may think that cutting down to featherweight would make him skinnier, but he said it actually made him fat. He became constipated because of it and felt the effects for months:

“At 45, I was really, really bad. I only did it for the title. I thought, if I could be champ in another division, let’s do it. But that was really rough on my body, man. It probably took me a couple months before I could even like digest my food right. When I ate, I just felt like I was in a constant constipated state. I couldn’t like digest my food. It just held everything. I was just looking fat, looking chubby. I’m not usually a fat dude. I think that weight cut just hurt my body.”

Welterweight Debut

‘Showtime’ then discussed his move up to welterweight. He claims that he felt confident in his skill level in the division, so he just needed a big fight. He discussed it with his coach Duke Roufus and decided the No. 4 Thompson was the perfect match.

Pettis got the fight. The only thing left, he said, was to recoup his energy after stopping his weight cuts:

“I already know the skill level is there,” Pettis said. “I just gotta get that energy back to where it’s supposed to be at, I think the weight cut has a lot to do with it, I told Duke I wanted to fight at 170, we looked at the roster. ‘Wonderboy’ made sense. Ranked No. 4 in the world. If I’m gonna try it, I might as well do it right.”

To him, the biggest difference is that he could actually work out for his fights now. He described the weight cut as making his brain foggy from dehydration. Now, however, he has his energy back:

“The biggest thing is the mental,” Pettis said. “Your brain isn’t foggy because you’re dehydrated. You’re not zapped of your energy. You can work out. I have energy to get ready for this fight.”

Wrestling Defense

Weight cut aside, Pettis has obviously been susceptible to wrestling offense in his rollercoaster run of the past four years. That was once a knock on Thompson, too, yet ‘Showtime’ praised him for adapting in a talented division:

“My style has been hindered because of the wrestling and I think he adapted to it well. He made these guys fight his style, at his range. He has great takedown defense. And he’s not like an offensive wrestler. So I think that leaves us with a stand-up fight. A whole lot of ninja shit will be happening — spins, jumps, flashy kicks. For us, it’s normal. It’s not like we’re trying to be flashy. That’s just how we fight.”

But his praise stopped there, with Pettis insisting Thompson couldn’t do much he hadn’t seen before:

“I just feel like there’s not much he can do to me,” Pettis said. “The side kicks, the round kicks, I’ve seen that so many times. He’s gonna throw straight punches and try to get my head to lean back for the traditional round kick. It’s offspeed, that’s why it throws all these kickboxers off. No one throws those kind of kicks in sparring, because it’s kickboxers usually sparring with us.”

Ultimately, the difference, at least for Pettis, was the fact that he actually trained to fight in Nashville:

“I got ready for a fight this camp,” Pettis said. “I didn’t get ready for a weight cut. The results will show.”