Matt Hughes' TUF Blog - Week Eight

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By Matt Hughes

With Tommy Speer’s win this week, I’ve broken the curse, so to speak, and it feels great, and I really feel like I’ve got two quality guys (Speer and Mac Danzig) in the quarterfinals. I’m heavily outnumbered, but I really like my guys. They’re not just fill-ins, they’re quality fighters.

Tommy Speer comes from the mold I came from. I was a wrestler that liked to impose my will and use my strength, and that’s what Tommy does. He imposes his will, uses his strength, and there’s no quit in Tommy whatsoever.

I did have to get Tommy to show more emotion this week, and even though I’m a poker face when I fight, I’m not just out there doing moves, and if I can use J-Roc (Jared Rollins) as an example, he was a guy out there who looked like he was out there just throwing punches and doing moves. I think if he would have shown a little more emotion and a little more dedication and a little bit more heart, he would have went out there and realized that he wasn’t winning on his feet, so maybe he would have tried a takedown or something like that. The mental aspect is what I’m getting at. There’s so much more to this sport than just the physical game. I’m a true believer in the fact that the sport is 50% physical and 50% mental.

Moving forward, I don’t know if Tommy’s going to be more emotional, but after that last fight, he knows just how mental this game is. It’s tough to have someone have your back with a rear naked choke set in, and your own blood running down your face. Honestly, the blood didn’t bother me that much because I couldn’t see how bad it was from across the Octagon, but when I saw that rear naked choke, I really thought that fight was over. He (Jon Koppenhaver) had his hooks sunk in, and I thought it was just a matter of time until he was gonna get it. Tommy had to have been thinking that this fight could have been stopped at any time, so that was a big win for him. Now he knows that the fight’s not over until the ref stops it. He’s gonna keep this win in his mind for a long time, and it’s gonna propel him to the next level.

Matt Serra was up to his old tricks again, trying to do an impression of me. Was it a good one? I don’t walk around looking in a mirror, so I wouldn’t know how to do an impression of Matt Hughes. But it just goes to show you what type of person Matt Serra is. And no, I’ve never done a Matt Serra impression, nor would I ever think about doing a Matt Serra impression.

I don’t know what Serra’s got planned for the quarterfinals, but I think he’s gonna try to get his good guys to the next round and sacrifice his week guys. As far as my two guys getting put together, if they do that, I will throw a fit. Me only having two guys, I don’t think it’s fair to put them against each other, and I wouldn’t have done that if I was Serra because that would have meant that I would have to put two of my own guys together. It just goes to show you that Matt Serra doesn’t care about his guys – he cares about getting a guy to the finals.

For more information on Matt Hughes, visit www.matt-hughes.com

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