Matt Browns förre jiu-jitsu-tränare Rodrigo Botti erkänner att han attackerade Matt Brown morgonen efter Browns förlust mot Demian Maia, men har en annan bild av händelseförloppet.
Matt Brown (20-14) säger att han blev slagen bakifrån av sin före detta jiu-jitsu coach Botti, något som Botti själv förnekar. Botti menar att Brown såg honom natten innan, medan Botti var ute och hälsade på vänner på Four Points Hotel direkt efter UFC 198, enligt vad Botti själv uppger till MMA fighting:
”I saw him the night before (Sunday) because I went to the hotel to see my friends, i went back to my hotel to sleep and went back to their hotel to say goodbye to my friends. When you’re cowardly assaulted like I was, you can’t control yourself. This guy destroyed my career, I lost part of my vision because of him, had to do another surgery. I couldn’t sleep normally for 15 months, it changed my entire life. I simply exploded (when I saw him).”
”I didn’t listen to the podcast and I’m not interested in listening to this guy’s voice, but I read that he said that I threw a punch that hit his shoulder. I guess he’s a bit confused. He said I hit the back of his head, and now that I hit his shoulder. He’s changing his story. But if he’s hurt somewhere it’s not his shoulder or the back of his head, but I don’t wanna get into more details. I’ll be honest, he’s in the past already. He was a coward when he did what he did to me, and I’m satisfied with my attitude now. We are even.”
Matt Brown och Rodrigo Botti saknar inte historia med varandra. I februari förra året anklagades Matt Brown av Botti för misshandel. Brown ska ”ha öppnat 16 stygn” i Bottis vänstra öga.
”I think what I did to him had the same proportion what he did to me. Not that much, actually, because when he attacked me he had a friend with him, and I was alone this time against him and three or four friends. And now this guy Vinicius Lemes got himself into trouble. He got himself into a fight he didn’t know what was all about, and he’s probably not sleeping well at night because he’s in trouble now.”
”And saying that I hit his shoulder… I won’t get into details, but do you think that an aggressive person like him would go after me outside the hotel if I had punched him? He punched a fan in his walk out because he grabbed his hood, and he didn’t go after me? He had a reason not to come after me, and this ‘Pequeno’ guy went after me.”
Under sitt framträdande på the Great MMA Debates podcast berättar Brown att han följde efter gärningsmannen, men att han stannade och tog bilder med fans när han inte hittade Botti utanför hotellet, något som Botti förnekar:
”Ok then. If he prefers to believe in this story to sleep better, no problem. Everything could have been prevented if he had admitted he was wrong when he attacked me, or at least called me apologizing. Everybody is entitled to make a mistake, but the problem is that he had a fight coming up with Johnny Hendricks and a win could get him a title shot, so he was afraid of being punished. He decided to lie about it. That’s when it became personal, brother. I would never work with him anymore, but if he apologized, I’d forget it.”
”If people are saying I was a coward against Matt Brown, which I don’t think I was, I’ll say that one cowardly action was paid back with another. But I don’t believe I was a coward.”
Botti, som inte bor i Curitiba där fighten ägde rum, säger att han inte var i staden för att kolla UFC, men erkänner att han hejade på Browns motståndare Demian Maia (23-6) under fighten. Maia vann matchen genom submission i tredje ronden.
”Demian trained with me since the blue belt at Alliance. I know him since 1998. And it could have been anyone else, like when I rooted for Johnny Hendricks when he fought him. How am I not going to root against him when he did what he did to me?”
”I don’t read the internet, anything. I don’t even work with fighting anymore, so what fans think make no difference to me. But I read somewhere that someone took a post from my Facebook page where I saw that I was going to Curitiba for some business I had, and people thought I was talking about (Brown). I came to Curitiba because I just signed a deal with a brand, I will represent them in America and Europe, and I came here to sign the papers and visit the factory. That’s why I came here.”
Vad tycker ni om Bottis utspel?
