Ahead of UFC Moncton, Court McGee detailed how a sneeze led to shoulder surgery for the Ultimate Fighter winner.
Moncton, NB — Court McGee, without question, has been through a lot. One of the most open fighters in the UFC, he has not shied away from the subject of his past drug addiction — in fact, he’s a motivational speaker on that very subject. And when it comes to the injuries incurred through his professional fighting career, he’s been through a lot as well. However, as he told the media ahead of UFC Moncton, he certainly didn’t expect to find out he needed shoulder surgery through a sneeze.
“I had labrum surgery. A compete labrum repair,” he said of his most recent trip under the knife. “Suffered in the last fight I guess. Tore, repaired. I wasn’t going to have it repaired, it was super sore, but I sneezed when I left the doctor’s office, and my shoulder fell out of socket, and then popped back in and I was like ‘alright.’ So I turned around and walked back in, I was like ‘I think I need to get it fixed.'”
That led to major surgery, and months of recovery. Yet when you think about it, were it not for that sneeze, he might have tried to train, spar, or even fight with the injury. And never did he consider calling it a career, at least not on this occasion.
“In the eight years I’ve been in the UFC, just over eight years, that was the seventh surgery that I’ve been put under for,” McGee said. “Outside of little lacerations and stuff. So like major surgeries.”
A previous wrist injury, which led to an extended layoff, was rough, “because they had to do a couple of revisions, and it didn’t take the first couple of times. That one I questioned a little bit. Like ‘man, I’ve been out almost two years, I don’t know if I have what it takes to compete.’ Because people grow when you stop.”
In that instance, McGee turned to a higher power. “I prayed about it, got the answer, surrounded myself with good people, my coaches, and they said ‘let’s go back and get it.’ So I came back, had a couple of great fights, then this injury popped up. But I never questioned coming back from this injury. Not at all. I was ready, like no doubt in my mind that I was coming back to compete.”
With all the stops and starts to his career, McGee should have plenty of experience tackling ring rust. But to him, it’s not ring rust in competition that’s the issue. Rather, rust at the parts of the fight game outside of the cage. “I dunno man. Ring rust, I don’t really believe in the ring rust itself in the competition,” he explained. “More so maybe like the exposure, a big crowd, the lights or the interviews. This is the challenging part to keep together, for me. But ring rust, I don’t think so. The way we train, you know you’ve got live rounds, you’ve got these partners, and I’ve been doing it, I figure, since the age of like six or seven minus the couple years I had the substance abuse and all those issues.”
That all adds up to about twenty-six years of mixed martial arts “except the one season of T-ball I had when I was like seven,” McGee calculated.
Asked about heading into enemy territory against Alex Garcia (Garcia, a native of the Dominican Republic, calls Montreal home), McGee noted that “there’s been a couple of controversial decisions in my history, and one here in Canada.” That, of course, would be his UFC 149 bout against Nick Ring, a close, bloody fight that wound up being a unanimous decision win for Ring.
As a result, McGee’s “first thought wasn’t about what I need to do to come out and beat [Garcia].” Instead, it was about avoiding any judging controversy. “If anything, it’s more motivation to go out and finish him,” McGee said. “The hometown advantage can be tricky sometimes. But there shouldn’t be a hometown advantage if judges are doing their job correctly.”
Court McGee meets Alex Garcia at UFC Moncton on Saturday, October 27 at the Avenir Centre in Moncton, NB. The card airs live on Fox Sports 1 (TSN 5).
