Kelvin Tiller is poised to be the breakout star at heavyweight in the PFL’s inaugural season, and proved it again at PFL 4.
Uniondale, NY — Kelvin Tiller is an admitted moma’s boy. He’s a middleweight, fighting up at heavyweight. He’s also very, very good. Something that was overlooked by just about everyone heading into the PFL’s regular season. That won’t be the case after PFL 4, however. Tiller finished Caio Alencar in the first round at PFL 1, a knockout. At PFL 4, he finished former UFC standout Jared Rosholt by submission in round two.
Nobody was talking about Kelvin Tiller coming into the Professional Fighters League’s inaugural season. “They’re talking about me now,” Tiller said backstage following PFL 4 on Thursday when that subject was brought up.
For Tiller, it’s all about family. “My mom and I — she’s a single mother. She raised us when we didn’t have nothing. Sometimes we didn’t have milk with our cereal. We had water sometimes. To come to this, it’s a beautiful feeling,” he told us. “She’s a good woman.”
Having been through so much, there’s one goal on Kelvin Tiller’s mind: “I’m gonna win that million dollars, I promise you all.”
Surprising many, Tiller chose to go to the ground with collegiate wrestling standout Rosholt. The takedown, in the first round, came by chance, he admitted. But he insisted that “I’m good everywhere. I can do it all. It’s all coming back. I had a year and four months off with an achilles tear, and everything’s just slowly coming back.” Driving him is “the best coaches,” and beyond that, “my mom pushes me, my kids push me,” he said.
Plus, when the going gets tough, the first thing in his head is “I know my momma yelling at me!”
Now that’s motivation.
On the subject of the competition moving forward, Tiller said that “I feel like I already took out the two best guys. So now I’m the best guy. Now they’ve gotta answer to me.” And he plans on getting better as the tournament goes on.
As for what makes him a great heavyweight? “I’m a middleweight, I got a lot of weight on me,” he joked. “We ain’t the best in the world yet,” he admitted. In his mind, he is, but he admits he has a lot to show. He’s not worried about the PFL point system or anything else. “All I know how to do is win,” he explained. Be it fighting, dancing, or anything else. “I don’t like to lose. I cry if I lose.”
And while Tiller was in a joking mood, he admitted that the motivation for winning the million dollar tournament was simple: “not being poor again.”
“I don’t want to be poor again. I don’t want to go back to that,” he said. I don’t want my kids to grow up the way we had to grow up.”
Don’t miss Kelvin Tiller’s full post-fight press scrum from PFL 4 above, including an appearance by his infamous mother!
