Chuck Liddell is looking at Tito Ortiz as a tune-up fight, and plans on continuing his MMA career if all goes well on Saturday night at Golden Boy MMA’s inaugural show.
‘The Ice Man’ cometh back (excuse the bad pun) this Saturday night, and Chuck Liddell is not planning for his return to MMA against longtime rival Tito Oriz to be a one-and-done. Instead, if all goes well, you can expect to see more of Liddell, who told Cageside Press on Tuesday that he had been offered other fighters, for even more money up front.
But for a number of reasons, Liddell opted to fight Ortiz for a third time. Tito, meanwhile, has been doing his best to get under Liddell’s skin. Heckling him at the open workouts last week, saying at Tuesday’s press conference that he in effect had spies in Liddell’s cap. To ‘The Ice Man,’ however, it’s old hat.
“He did the same thing with Stephan Bonnar,” Liddell pointed out, referring to the pair’s infamous fight back in Bellator MMA a few years ago. “It’s the exact same line. He can’t come up with a new one? He can’t create something else, something new, something a little more developed? It’s the exact same thing he did with Bonnar.”
Liddell’s been clear that the potential for the biggest payday of his career rests in the acceptance of this fight by the PPV buying public. “It’s a possibility,” he said, though not a guarantee. “I had offers with a lot higher guarantees to fight other people,” Liddell said Tuesday. “This was something, I needed a tune up fight, and that’s one of the reasons I’m here.”
Key term in that, tune up. If it ends with Liddell’s hand raised, he intends to keep going, even just a few years shy of fifty. “If everything goes the way I expect it to on Saturday night then yes, I will be back again.”
Liddell vs. Ortiz 3 takes place Saturday, November 24 at The Forum in Los Angeles, CA. The event airs live on PPV.
