Joe Stevenson continues his ascendancy in the Lightweight division
Published by Zach Arnold on October 25th, 2009 in Current Events

 Print |  Email |  RSS

Coming off of a big win against Nate Diaz last June, Joe “Daddy” Stevenson has really been working hard with Greg Jackson’s camp in New Mexico to reinvent himself as a fighter. As expected, Stevenson brought the goods at UFC 104 when he pummeled Spencer Fisher. By the time the fight was over, fans and fighters were wondering why Fisher wanted the fight in the first place.

Fisher, in a pre-fight interview with F a n h o u s e . c o m, said that he didn’t have a chip on his shoulder, but…

“No, no chip (on my shoulder), I try to punch just as hard as the next guy so I’m just going to look out to get the W, that’s my focus to come out there and beat Joe handily.

“Well, Greg Jackson’s camp is the #1 camp as far as paper goes, uh, that’s big attribute that he has gone to a better camp. Um, but talking about myself, I know what I’ve done as a fighter and I try to not just prepare for Joe Stevenson but to prepare myself as a better fighter in general and I brought in better wrestlers and uh I think that that was my biggest weakness of being a wrestler and getting taken down, this time I’m a little older and a little smarter so I’m going to try to bring in wrestlers and try to improve my wrestling all-around. No, I don’t look at any tape, I don’t watch any tapes of anybody, I know what I see about Joe, I know that Joe is going to try to take me down and that’s all he’s going to do, he’s going to try to take me down, he’s going to hit me with his karate punches and try to take me down. My camp does that (tape watching), I don’t think anything, that’s not arrogant or cocky but I don’t want to focus on one particular thing that Joe’s going to do in his past fights because he could come out, act like he’s going to shoot and throw an overhand right and that could happen so I don’t do tapes.”

Fisher was confident going into the fight, so much so that he reiterated his stance about wanting a fight with Lightweight champion BJ Penn.

“BJ Penn is the best fighter pound-for-pound in the world, I think he is, and saying that I don’t care if it’s for a title fight, I don’t care if I won this fight or lose it, I don’t care if he wins that fight or loses it, I’m a fighter who will stand with BJ Penn, I will go for him the whole time and that’s the kind of fight people want to see.”

Spencer might have to wait a little longer after getting brutally beaten by Stevenson on Saturday night. Stevenson, in a pre-fight interview with Fanhouse.com, was in a very positive mood heading into the fight and understood that Fisher thought his game plan was ‘predictable.’

“Yeah, he should, but he’s got to stop me, it’s not a big secret. He’s going to run around the ring and kind of point hit at me because he’s going to be afraid of the takedowns, so you’re not going to see him very aggressive, you’re going to see more of a standoffish. At least with when I fought, he was like, if you can take me down I’m going to hit you as hard as I can whereas Spencer’s going to do a lot of pitter-pat and jogging around the cage, that’s cool and all, I mean it’s no secret, yeah, but honestly if I hit him he’s going to feel it and it’s going to hurt him so I mean I don’t know what he’s thinking. He’s got a couple of cool little back elbow things. He’s got tenacity, he’s got a lot of energy, he’s got um a great personality for fighting because he doesn’t quit and he will go and go and go and he’s beat some of the best guys out there. I think stylistically I’m a great match-up for him and it’s going to be a real hard night for him.”

Truth in advertising is often a rarity in the fight business.

As documented extensively before his fight with Nate Diaz last June on Spike TV, Stevenson decided to change everything up in his personal and professional life in order to keep his career in the UFC. While Stevenson says he doesn’t want his entire personal life consumed by all-things-UFC, he is spending approximately half of the year away from his family in order to become a champion. New Mexico is a bit far away from Southern California.

“Sometimes you got to relocate and get your mind out of you know the constant bother of negatives and everything’s going and reinvent yourself, honestly. Tell you the truth like to me I wasn’t looking at it like Loser Leaves, but yeah it was in the back of my head and I figured I still have one fight on my contract, but still it’s not cool at all to feel that pressure and it’s not so much getting cut, you know if I lose my contract with the UFC maybe I go to Japan to beat some people that I want to fight and other than that, I go get a regular job and raise my kids and be a happy Dad. I told my wife, she knows, my wife and I know that we’re doing this to be the best, to get that belt, to be to have the not to like to get into clubs, that’s not why it is like we’re willing on the drop of a dime to quit, I asked her you know like it’s hard, I spend half of the year away from my family, half the year, that’s like six months out of a year I’m not at home and I’m not fighting a war in like Iraq or Afghanistan like you know everyone else is, it’s you know it’s a choice and honestly I tell her, if she ever wanted me to stay at home and get a job I would and she knows, but she knows that you can’t live your life wondering ‘what if?’”

For Stevenson, fighting at UFC 104 in Los Angeles at the Staples Center was a dream come true.

“Dude, I’m excited, I always wanted to fight at The Forum when I was a little kid, I didn’t want to fight, I wanted to do something I didn’t know what it was going to be and now I’m at the Staples Center and that’s kind of like the modern Forum, so it’s really exciting for me. I literally grew up in Lennox, which is right down the street, they tore down my elementary school to build I think the 105 freeway and then moved the large like I remember, we used to go play soccer you know it was cool and to be able to fight in that same spot, I’m excited.”

It’s very clear that Stevenson can see the light at the tunnel and perhaps get a shot at BJ Penn in 2010.

“You have to win them all, so no matter how many fights in a row that you have, you have to win them all. And impressively, too, you can’t just be squeaking on by because no one wants to see that and on top of that, no one’s going to be interested in talking about it, it’s got to be impressive victory you know, you have to establish something exciting in the fight. All my fights I get a Fight of the Night, knockout, submission, something happens because I go out there and I leave it all out there and I really want to walk away with the W. I would rather lose by a submission or get knocked out than lose a decision that’s close because you know you lose that decision and it can go either way or you lose a decision and you got handled the whole time, you know those are something that you couldn’t change, you can’t change the decision is up to them. When you finish someone, you know, that puts an exclamation point.”

In Stevenson’s post-fight interview with UFC, he seemed somewhat upset with his initial first round performance against Fisher.

“Very upset with uh my initial takedowns, very good on getting in, not being able to finish him, to just assume that it would be easy you know going against this high-caliber opponent, you can’t just assume they’re going to fall down for you. Um, but as far as executing my game plan, it was to the letter. Showing a little bit of hurt from that lead leg kick made him commit it more so the takedown would be easier, kind of fell into play, trying to read him what he was trying to do on bottom, was he trying to get up, was he trying to sweep me, um, and getting into a dominant position and being able to neutralize all of his offense and just focus on mine.”

In a post-fight interview with Fanhouse.com, Stevenson elaborated… and leveled a big charge against Fisher.

“Um, I executed a lot of things right but I felt like I couldn’t get the takedown, I was making the excuses like I was like man he feels slippery, he feels oiled up, and I felt like he was but why even say anything like that? It’s my fault for even taking it there.”

“Oh yeah, definitely he put some like lotion on this morning or last night took a bath, something was different about him, maybe he had a lot of garlic though, that can make you slippery as well.”

“Never, never complained about it either, he was just, he felt a little slippery to me, it could just be in my head and that’s why I need to improve myself.”

Greasing, of course, is a charge that can you get in a lot of hot water and negative attention. Just ask Hidehiko Yoshida and Georges St. Pierre about that.

Stevenson didn’t understand why Fisher was trash-talking him going into the fight.

“No, I’ve… I didn’t even know it was like that until afterwards. Honestly, I thought they forced him to take the fight, you know stylistically I was like, really, dude, are you serious? All right, happy birthday!”

After Joe Daddy gave Spencer his birthday beatdown, he explained the source of his new-found happiness and confidence.

“I’m feeling good evidently, you know, coming off a win, honestly when I’m sitting there everyone else is like, oh, why are we here? You know when people want to see you, that’s a good thing. Understand it takes away from personal life but that’s what we sign away when we do this job. If my wife and I are arguing and a fan comes up to me, it’s like can I take a picture, I smile and I say yeah because when I went up to Ken Griffey Jr. and like, hey can I get your autograph? and he shunned me, I was like, ugh and I promised myself that I would never do that to anyone.

It’s all about putting yourself in a positive mindset and I mean it’s, what you tell yourself is what you’re going to believe because you talk to yourself the most out of anyone, so it’s about being positive.”

Stevenson explained about why fighters seemed so relieved after a fighter while they feel anxious in the preparation and lead-up to a fight.

“See, um, honestly it’s about training right. You know, fighting is not where we get hurt, we get hurt training. That’s preparing ourselves, that’s where we get our bumps and our bruises, um, the fighting’s the easy part, that’s why I’m happy, when I fight, during the fight, honestly the preparation, the turmoil, everything that’s what’s hard. As long as you learn how to do that right which with enough experience you can, I was 175 today. Weighed in at 156, you know, putting on that weight right, I cut from 170 at the beginning of this week, 175 the week before, so when I put it on it was actual true size and not just water retention. Doing that right is experience and so is fighting and training and it all just accumulates. You can’t buy experience.”

Collectively I’ve been in New Mexico more than I am in Victorville because I go out there for two months, it’s amazing, people back home, it wasn’t for them and the support group I might as well just give up. I mean I’m there so much away from my family, away from my friends, luckily I’ve made a family there and I’ve made friends there, uh, it’s so important over there I can donate two months before for each fight there plus go to help my partners during my off-season back in New Mexico and so three fights a year, six months a year, now you don’t know what I’m going to do out there to you and I’m good and well-rounded enough at all the above to where that if you have to second-guess anything I do you’re in trouble.

Honestly, it’s about the whole being unpredictable, being able to expand the horizons and learn more and be more of a threat to everyone, I mean, honestly, I’ll fight anyone in the world at any time, that’s how I’ve always been but now they have to worry.”

If Stevenson can’t face Penn right away, is there a dream opponent he would like to face?

“I want (Shin’ya) Aoki, he’s in Japan and I pray to God somehow that it happens. Other than that, I’d like to fight anyone that’s beaten me in the UFC, I beg for it.”