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Geoff Neal | Ready To Scratch That Itch
DWCS Grad Eager To Return To Action And Remind Everyone He’s A Threat In The Welterweight Division
Geoff Neal has fought once in the last 18 months and it lasted 90 seconds and ended in an injury stoppage.
“It feels anticlimactic, underwhelming,” the Fortis MMA man said when asked about his abbreviated bout with Rafael Dos Anjos last October just a few days ahead of his return to action this weekend against Carlos Prates at UFC 319 in Chicago. “I wanted more. I feel like I was gonna win that fight regardless, but I wanted to fight; that’s what I do and it helps you get better and learn more.
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“A win is a win, so I’ll take that win, but I wanted to do more.”
Neal looked sharp out of the chute, bouncing on his toes and dropping the former lightweight champion with a clean left hand to the temple less than a minute into the contest, but after allowing Dos Anjos back to his feet, the Brazilian veteran felt something let go in his left leg and dropped to the canvas in surrender, ending the contest abruptly and leaving Neal wanting more.
He was originally scheduled to return to action against Prates in April at UFC 314, but an elbow injury forced him out of the contest and under the knife, extending his time away from the Octagon. I asked him if that longing to compete felt a little like there was an itch under his skin that he just couldn’t scratch, and the veteran welterweight agreed wholeheartedly.
"Yeah, exactly,” he said in response, chuckling. “I’m really ready to fight this time. Saturday can’t come soon enough.”
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For some, stepping into the Octagon and getting to compete is the payoff for the long hours spent in the gym and all that work done in the shadows. It’s the bowl of ice cream you earned as a child after cleaning your plate of all the vegetables sat upon it when it arrived in front of you, and the willingness to eat all those vegetables just doesn’t feel the same when a bowl of ice cream doesn’t follow.
But Neal, who sits at No. 11 in the welterweight rankings, one spot ahead of his Brazilian foe, doesn’t approach things that way; it’s not a “do one in order to get the other situation” for the Dana White’s Contender Series grad.
In terms of the above analogy, “Handz of Steel” doesn’t mind eating his vegetables. In fact, he loves them.
“You’ve gotta fall in love with the grind, and I love the grind of the camp,” he said when asked about navigating the “effort and reward” dichotomy in situations like his where he’s barely gotten a chance to let go of his hands despite hours spent preparing to do so. “Some people dread going to the gym, busting their a**, but I’m the type that loves doing that because it makes me feel complete.
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“I like to go out there and just work myself to the point of exhaustion — that’s something I’ve always done — so it’s not something where I need to get myself back into the swing of things. I’m mentally there, always.”
Being mentally dialed in and loving the grimier bits that precede making the walk and standing under the bright lights is a massive piece of what helps make a fighter successful, and can at times counteract other variables that often factor into that equation, including age.
Though he turns 35 towards the end of the month, the typically soft-spoken Texan generally doesn’t think about his age, outside of understanding that he can’t just stroll into the gym and hustle right out onto the mats without stretching anymore.
“I forget that I’m 34; other people remind me,” said Neal when asked if his approaching birthday creates a sense of urgency heading into Saturday night’s clash with Prates at United Center. “For some reason, when people ask me how old I am, I wanna be like, ‘I’m 28, 29,’ that’s the first thing that wants to come out of my mouth.
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“Age is age,” he continued. “I have some soreness in my back sometimes when I wake up, so I just have to make sure my recovery is good and I warm up a lot.
“The younger guys will turn up 10 minutes before practice, jump on the mat, and go at it. I understand I’m getting up there, so I turn up 30 minutes before, but I’ve done that my whole career; now it’s just more imperative that I do that.”
In addition to his pre-training stretches and loosening up, Neal has done the work necessary to prepare for Prates, who shifted from that UFC 314 fight card in Miami to a main event assignment opposite Ian Machado Garry a few weeks later in Kansas City when Neal was forced out of the matchup.
The Fighting Nerds representative landed on the wrong side of the scorecards in a bout where the Irishman largely worked on the outside and looked to mix in takedowns, staying away from Prates’ power until getting touched and troubled in the late stages of the fight.
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Though he knows what it’s like to share the Octagon with Machado Garry, having battled him to a split decision at UFC 298 in the early part of last year, Neal didn’t feel like there was much to be a gleaned from Prates’ bout with “The Future” as he readies for this one on Saturday.
“They’re completely different fights, so I really don’t look at it and try to make comparisons,” he said in regard to finding takeaways from his current adversary having faced a common opponent. “They’re way different, so I don’t really look at that fight as something to game plan against him.
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UFC 319 Countdown | Geoff Neal vs Carlos Prates
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“We have a lot of key points we’ve keyed on when it comes to him,” continued Neal, “but I don’t want to divulge too much. There’s a lot of things that he does that I can take advantage of and I plan on doing that.”
The fight comes at an interesting time for both the men involved and the division as a whole, as the landscape in the welterweight ranks has shifted dramatically in the last couple years, resulting in the names commonly pointed to as potential title challengers and those being close to contention having changed a great deal.
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While veterans like Colby Covington and Gilbert Burns have tumbled down the rankings and others like Vicente Luque no longer sport a number next to their name, the group of emerging threats now consists of fighters like Machado Garry, Shavkat Rakhmonov, Sean Brady, and Michael Morales.
For a number of years, Neal sat within arm’s reach of a championship opportunity. Though he landed on the wrong side of the results in clashes with both Rakhmonov and the Irish welterweight, he did more than hold his own in each pairing, which solidified his place as a Top 10 staple and dark horse contender in the division.
But 18 months with only 90 seconds in the Octagon and the constant churn of events has pushed Neal out of the Top 10 and off the list of names people mention when discussing those close to challenging for the title in the 170-pound ranks at the moment.
So what does he need to do in order to get himself back into those conversations?
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“I gotta knock his a** out,” he said flatly. “I gotta get a big finish; that’s the only option. If that’s what I wanna do, then that’s what I need to do.”
And after a couple years without really, truly experiencing that winning feeling, Neal is chomping at the bit to get back out there and let it fly this weekend.
“I’m itching to do it. I cannot wait. It’s been a long time.”
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