Miguel Torres would like to let you know that he’s back
Published by Zach Arnold on November 2nd, 2009 in Current Events

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Miguel Torres is not a happy man right now.

“When I get back in the cage, I feel sorry for whoever my opponent is because I’m not going to change the way I fight, I’m going to make it better and my opponent’s not going to have a good time,” said Torres in a recent interview with Mike Straka of Fox News Fight. The former WEC Bantamweight champion thinks he has figured out the reasons as to why he lost to Brian Bowles last August in Las Vegas.

“I traveled too much, too much PR, uh it wasn’t the pressure of the fight or the magnitude of the fight, I think it was more the pressure of all the PR and traveling that I had to do. That combined with my training camp and not being to able to put in the time that I should. I’m not making any excuses, Brian Bowles knocked me the hell out, he caught me in the ear, when I hit the ground I was already asleep, I was moving but that was on autopilot. Um, he did a great job, uh, he knew the pressures I was going through and he had a good training camp and he did a good job. Um, but when I fight Brian again it’s going to be a different fight and like I said whether it’s Brian or whoever else I fight next, I feel bad for you and your family.”

Torres faces a multitude of challengers at 135 pounds — including arch nemesis Takeya Mizugaki, Dominick Cruz (who used to fight at Featherweight and lost to Urijah Faber), and champion Brian Bowles.

“The 135 pound division is very strong. The fact is anybody at that weight class can cause an upset. Whether you have two fights or you have 40 fights, everybody’s training differently now. It’s not like you’re fighting a grappler or a wrestler or a striker, you’re fighting a guy who’s training with a camp that trains in everything — grappling, jiu-jitsu, kickboxing, boxing, whatever it is. So anybody that has that knockout power, that one… the gloves are four ounces so one punch can change the quest of the fight and it’s a different time.”

In a recent interview with AOL Fanhouse (m m a . f a n h o u s e . c o m), Torres elaborated on the some of the challenges he faces in his career next and how he thinks the lessons he learned from losing to Brian Bowles will help him become a better fighter and a better champion.

START OF INTERVIEW

INTERVIEWER: “Well the last time we saw you in action obviously a little bit of a disappointing performance. I’m sure you’ve had time to stomach and digest it all, what went wrong out there?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Um, I traveled way too much for the training camp. Uh, my training partners you know they did the best job they could but it was my fault, you know, I was doing way too much PR, way too much traveling and uh I’m not going to say I took Bowles lightly but I was way too aggressive, you know. Uh, I hit him and I hurt him and I chased him instead of letting him chase me and uh I can’t do that all the time and people see the old fights that I’ve had and see that I chase guys and he was ready for that, so it won’t happen again. It will make me a better fighter. I don’t think uh a great fighter’s wins define him, I think it’s how he comes back from a loss. This gives me a chance to come back and not redefine myself but make myself better.”

INTERVIEWER: “Well, you know you’re one of the golden boys of the WEC. You, Mike Brown, Urijah Faber, do you feel as though there was too much pressure put on you to continue that winning streak, to continue growing the Bantamweight division and that sort of uh you know added a bit to it?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “I wouldn’t say it was pressure from all those things, I think it was just the way that I was fighting. I was trying to fight to appeal to the fans instead of fighting to the weakness of my opponent. I was trying to make the 135 pound weight class very popular by fighting exciting fights and you can’t always do that, especially against a guy that hits you really hard. I got ear-holed in that fight and when I hit the ground I was asleep. It won’t happen again. I’m going to come back and be smarter.”

INTERVIEWER: “All right, so when are we going to see you back in action again?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “They wanted me to fight in December, I couldn’t do it. I had a bunch of obligations. I just did a movie last week. I’m here this week, I got a seminar, I was training with (Miguel) Cotto, so I got all these different things coming up until November so there was no way I could do a full training camp. Um, maybe February or March, um, my next training camp I’m going to have two months either with (Mark) Dellagrotte or with Demian Maia and Robert Drysdale so depending on who I fight, I’m going to be gone for two months so I want to make sure that I keep myself to the right people.”

INTERVIEWER: “What was the movie?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Circle of Pain. It’s going to come out, it’s me, Kimbo, Frank Mir, Roger Huerta, Din Thomas, couple of good fighters in the movie so…”

INTERVIEWER: “What do you think of Kimbo?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “He’s down to earth, he’s a nice guy, I like Kimbo. I respect him for coming to the show, coming to the UFC, he could have stayed fighting uh wherever he fighting at for a lot money but he decided to come and test himself so.”

INTERVIEWER: “Well, so you say you’re probably going to fight January or February. Are you antsy to get back in there? I mean, if you fight in February, it would be almost if my math is right like six months since your last fight. Don’t you kind of want to get back in there and prove that that was just a fluke?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “You know, honestly, this loss was the best thing that could have happened to me. Um, after the loss, I had no attention for two months. I was able to get back to my gym, get back to my family, get back with my friends, enjoy myself, travel and actually make money, do seminars, make my gym grow and get back to my life. I put my life on hold for two years and uh to get back and not have any pressure felt pretty good. Now I know I have to do when I get back, how to approach the situation, how to be smarter about it, and uh I’m going to be a different person.”

INTERVIEWER: “Is there someone in particular that you’d like to fight next?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Whoever is going to be put me in line to fight Brian Bowles or whoever has the belt at the time.”

INTERVIEWER: “So you think you will get a shot at the title right away?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “I should. I should.”

INTERVIEWER: “Who do you think would win if it looks like (Dominick) Cruz and Bowles are going to fight next, who do you think is going to win?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Bowles is tough and he hits you really hard but I think Cruz has a more complete game than Bowles does and I think Cruz will test him.”

INTERVIEWER: “Any interest in a Mizugaki re-match? There were some rumblings that that was going to happen.”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Uh, I want to fight Mizugaki again, too, he’s one of those guys but if fighting Mizugaki puts me in line to get my belt back then I’ll do that. I want to fight whoever’s going to put me in line to get me a title shot.”

INTERVIEWER: “All right and finally you mentioned that you were training with Miguel Cotto. He has a huge fight coming up on November 14th against Manny Pacquiao. Were you impressed with him?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “You know what, man, Cotto really impressed me. Not just his style but how he takes the approach to his fights. You know his training camp is very impressive, um, I took a lot of pointers from that and how he trains and how he’s you know not just the thought process, we had the same thought process but how he goes about developing that. He’s a world class boxer and they do things a little bit different than we do.”

INTERVIEWER: “You show him some MMA moves?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “No, not really. I got to train at his camp, I didn’t want to you know interfere too much, I didn’t know him before and the second day we talked a little bit for like about an hour and a half playing X-Box and he’s a cool-ass dude man, I like him, don’t let him fool you he speaks English so be careful and you know he’s a cool guy, he’s just a regular guy that loves to fight, too, he’s in a different sport.”

INTERVIEWER: “I have a feeling I know what you’re going to say here, but who do you think’s going to win in that fight?”

MIGUEL TORRES: “Cotto by devastating knockout in round one or two. He hits hard as shit dude, he hits hard as shit.”

END