Ultimate Fighter 14 alum Marcus Brimage will step into the UFC octagon for the first time in over a year next weekend in Las Vegas at UFC 175 as he will meet Russell Doane in the first fight of the main card on pay-per-view.
By the time Brimage enters the cage next Saturday night, it will have been 455 days since he was defeated by Conor McGregor at UFC on FUEL TV 9. Following the event, he suffered an injury in training and the injury required surgery.
Brimage (6-2) would be out for eight months with an injury and being away from competing was difficult for him. During his appearance on “The MMA Report Live,” Brimage explained that he had to distance himself from the sport at one point.
“At one point, I had to distance myself from MMA and the UFC in general,” Brimage said. “That process actually helped motivate me to get back in there as soon as I was able to start training again.”
How did Brimage distance himself from the sport and the UFC? He opened up about financial problems and how he needed to get a job as a personal trainer.
“During that time, I went through financial struggle so I became a personal trainer at Gold’s Gym and I just played a lot of video games,” Brimage said. “I got into a relationship and started enjoying life but as soon as the doctor said I was good to go, is was just like a switch turned on and I was back to beast mode.”
After returning to training, Brimage decided that he would drop down to the bantamweight division after a run as a featherweight. The main factor in dropping down to the lower weight class was due to the featherweights in the UFC being much bigger than him.
“The opponents was the main factor because everyone was so much bigger,” he said. “During the weigh-ins, people were kind of small and then the next day I’m like ‘ok, he was not that big yesterday.’ The height factor was one thing because I was the shortest featherweight on the UFC roster. Now at bantamweight, my height is the average or the norm of the bantamweight class.”
He will face Doane (13-3) next Saturday night, who is currently on a two fight winning streak and defeated Leandro Issa in his UFC debut at the beginning of the year at UFC Fight Night 34. Doane defeated Issa by technical submission in January and not only is Brimage aware of his ground game, he is also aware of the power that he has in his right hand.
“Russell Doane is a very dangerous opponent,” Brimage stated. “He is very heavy handed with the right. You saw that in his UFC debut. He dropped his opponent with the heavy right. Pretty good ground game. To have your UFC debut and tap out a black belt that says something. He is very calm, he is very patient, he is slick on the ground, and he is heavy handed. I have to make sure my widths are about me because he is a very dangerous opponent.”
One of the cliche’s that is over used in the fight game is, “this is the biggest fight of my career.” Let’s be honest, every fight is the biggest fight in the career of a fighter. For Brimage, he does view this fight as his biggest fight, but every fight in the UFC is the biggest for him.
“Anytime I fight in the UFC, it’s always the biggest fight of my career. Even though this is pay-per-view, it doesn’t matter to me. Facebook, Fox Sports 1, pay-per-view — every fight for the UFC is very important fight to me.”
Just like every fighter, Brimage has thought in his head how he will win this fight but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how he wins as long as he walks away with the victory.
“I always mediate about different scenarios on how I am going to win the fight. The only thing that is important to me is my hand getting raised and that’s it. Knockout, submission, decision — I am going to win. That is all that matters to me.”