Athletes
Anthony Smith | The Final Walk
Veteran Light Heavyweight Anthony Smith Reflects On His Storied Career Ahead Of His Final Fight Inside the Octagon At UFC Kansas City
Anthony Smith didn’t need this.
“My car just died on the interstate,” said the longtime light heavyweight contender.
At the tail-end of the final training camp of his professional mixed martial arts career, Smith was driving to the airport to work the UFC 314 broadcast in Miami when his car had other ideas. There was no panic in his voice, just annoyance, and as he made it to the side of the road, he asked if we could resume our chat when he got back the following week, he called a tow truck, then an Uber, and he made it to South Florida in time.
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In one way, shape or form, that’s been his life since 2008, when he first strapped on a pair of gloves for pay and began a career that ends on Saturday night in Kansas City. Perhaps it would have been fitting for him to lay down the gloves next week in Des Moines, considering that his first pro fight was in Sioux City, Iowa, but things rarely took a conventional route for the man dubbed “Lionheart.”
Back then, he just wanted to make ends meet, and in a lot of ways, he fit the stereotype of being a prizefighter because he could punch somebody in the mouth and not get in trouble for it. But as the years went on, it was clear that he wasn’t just a brawler, though he could do that with the best of them. What he was, well, that took different forms. He could strike, he could submit opponents, he could get folks out of there early or swim in deep waters. More than anything, though, he wanted to win more than the guy standing across from him on fight night. That got him to the UFC, first in 2013, and then for good in 2016.
Anthony Smith | Top Finishes
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Anthony Smith | Top Finishes
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Most impressively, he made it to the top of the mountain in the UFC, fighting Jon Jones for the light heavyweight title in 2019 and beating the likes of Rashad Evans, “Shogun” Rua, Volkan Oezdemir and Alexander Gustafsson, all while life often conspired against him. He would lose beloved family members, awake one night to a home invasion attempt, battle the usual array of injuries, and spend too much time away from his wife and daughters, yet when the phone rang with a fight, he’d answer, show up and give it whatever he had.
That’s a long time to live that life, and when his longtime coach, friend and mentor Scotty Morton suffered a heart attack and passed away at the age of 47 late last year, that was the signal to Smith that it was time to go.
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“When Scotty died, it changed the whole game for me,” he said. “It changed the whole game. I've been with Scott since I was 17 years old. I'll be 37 in a couple months, so almost 20 years. I can't recall a legitimate argument he and I ever had. It feels so disrespectful to say he was my coach, but obviously that's what he was. But I have an actual brother that I am not super close with. I have a little sister that I'm estranged from. He (Morton) was closer to me than any human that's walking this planet. He knew everything about me. It was like a true brotherhood, like a brother that you chose, not one that you're forced to have. And this whole thing is different without him.”
Smith was preparing for a December bout against Dominick Reyes when he got the call about Morton’s death. No one would have blinked an eye if he pulled out of the fight. But as he told me before the fight, “That’s not what we do.”
So he made the walk that night at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, his body ready but his mind somewhere else, and it wasn’t surprising that he got stopped in two rounds by Reyes. Many believed he would lay his gloves down in the Octagon, but he didn’t. He went home, regrouped, and decided he would make the walk once more. The opponent? Rising Chinese star Zhang Mingyang. It wasn’t the farewell fight most would expect, but Smith has never followed a conventional route in anything that he’s done. Then again, unconventional for his peers is conventional for him.
“I didn't ask for anybody,” said Smith. “They called and I said, yes. That's how this goes. I can't stop how I'm working. I can't change it at the end.”
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He laughs.
“They called and said, what do you think about this? And I said, why this guy? And they gave me a pretty thoughtful answer. I said, okay, it's good enough for me. You got a reason. I'm good with it.”
It’s a good reason why Smith is one of the better analysts in the game. He obviously has the fighting part down, but he’s also well aware of how the business works. And while handing Smith the final loss of his career does wonders for Zhang’s profile while Smith goes back to the broadcast desk, the 36-year-old likes his chances against another surging prospect.
Anthony Smith Fight Week Interview | UFC Kansas City
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Anthony Smith Fight Week Interview | UFC Kansas City
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“None of the young guys have ever beaten me,” said Smith. “And they don't really lose a lot because I beat all the young guys, so it doesn't really hurt him if I beat him and it doesn't hurt their ability to promote him. And no one ever washes me in the first round. So it's not like he's going to smoke me in the first round. I'm probably one of the few guys that can probably handle him for his hardest five minutes. And then after five minutes, then we'll see how good he really is.”
That’s always been Smith’s M.O. When you think he’s down, he’ll rise up, when you think he’s the underdog, he’ll bite back. It’s been like that forever, and if he does take Zhang out of the first round and then drowns him, hey, he’s human, and when you pull off superhuman feats, the first reflex is to want to do it again. He insists he’s not going to be that guy.
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“I'm good with being done,” Smith said. “I'll still have the itch, and I'll still want to fight, but I'm ready. I want to do this one more time for me so that I know this is my last opportunity to leave whatever I got left in there one more time.”
I ask him if he has any regrets, and he says, “No. Not one. I kind of wish I had one.”
He does, and that’s not having his friend Scotty around. And he felt it every day of training camp, and even before he made the usual trip to the Factory X gym in Colorado.
“My in-between fights is different,” said Smith. “I’d go, I’d fight, I’d take a week off and then Scotty starts hounding me like, ‘Hey man, enough of the beer in the driveway. We got to get back to jitsu.’ So it's him dragging me in a couple times a week at noon to help him train the cops and then putting the gear on, rolling a little bit, but really coaching and helping the younger guys. And that's how he always drug me back in. It wasn't a coach mentality. He was like, ‘I need your help.’ So all of that is gone. Every f**king day I leave every training session and I almost grab my phone to call Scott because that's what I've been doing since 2016, since I started training at Factory X.”
Smith pauses, and I fill in the silence by telling him that Scotty would have been happy that he’s getting out of the sport on his own terms, free to continue his analyst gigs while spending time with the family and going to all his kids’ games and matches. He might not be too happy about Smith’s new obsession with scuba diving, but you gotta let the old man roam a bit.
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“He didn't want me to last this long,” said Smith. “So he’s definitely happy. He was ready for me to be done three fights ago. He would just always say, ‘Dude, you don't have to do this anymore. Why are we still doing this?’ And I would always say, ‘F**k. I don't know.’ I just feel like I would know when it was time and I didn't feel it then, but I feel it now.”
And 15 minutes or less after he steps into the Octagon to face Zhang Mingyang, it will be time. But there’s work to be done first.
“We got one more young guy to slay and then we're getting the f**k out of here,” Smith said. “I'm going to put him in a washing machine for five minutes and then we'll see what he looks like after that.”
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