Kelvin Tiller had one of the most impressive performances of PFL 3 2019, hitting an excellent kimura in the first round.
Uniondale, NY – Kelvin Tiller came away with six points at PFL 3 2019 following a great kimura finish on Muhammed DeReese. He’s ready to show what else he’s got in the arsenal this year.
“I’ve always been one of those guys where if someone says they’re better than me at something, I want to show that they’re not better than me. I knew his gameplan was to take me to the ground. I watched a lot of his fights. Amateur fights, pro fights. He does the same thing. He doesn’t like to stand up. He doesn’t like to get hit. I knew he was going to throw some kicks to get me off my game. My gameplan was to submit him. I saw the triangle choke coming because I’ve seen him be lazy before. I knew he would give me a submission. I’m good everywhere. I said it last year. I’ll say it again: I am good everywhere. So I knew eventually he would give something up. And in the first round. It went perfectly. I’ve got more than one submission. I submitted Jared Rosholt last year. I knew he wasn’t a better wrestler than him. That was not a fluke, I’d win again. I’m just better everywhere. My gameplan was perfect.”
Kelvin Tiller is nicknamed “The Mama’s Boy” and his mom was in attendance for this fight, joining Tiller for his post-fight interview. Tiller gave some backstory and how that crafted him into the man he is today.
“I grew up in a one-bedroom apartment. Three sisters, me, and my mom, who was very poor. So to be here today and to have her here to see me with all of this, ESPN, all you guys. This is beautiful to us. To see her out there cheering, I saw a video of her going crazy after I won. It’s a beautiful feeling. People said I wouldn’t make it to 18. Then they said I wouldn’t make it to 21. So for her to see me at 28, I’ll be 29 this month. For her to see me perform at the level I’m performing on, it’s beautiful. She didn’t have to bury me when I was 18 or 21 like they said. And I’m still here today doing some positive stuff. I do a lot for my community. I take good care of my kids. I just want to inspire. I want to uplift people. I used to run the streets big time, so for me to be here and to be positive, like how I am today. I’m really trying to look out for the kids that are coming up behind me. I don’t post crazy stuff on my social media. I don’t cuss on my social media – well, I did just cuss on my social media – I usually don’t cuss on my social media. I don’t put nothing sexual up. The things that you see people doing today, I don’t do those things because I want to inspire young kids. Not just the kids that I have, but young kids that look up to me. The kids from my neighborhood. The kids that come from Topeka, Kansas, Kansas City, around the world. I really want to help them become better people. So I make sure I do the right things.”
With a strong start to the season, Tiller still sees the only direction to go as up. He added descriptions of how athletic he is for such a big guy.
“More fireworks. I go to finish fights. I don’t like to go to decisions. We train hard. I’m with professor Claudio Mattos now in Kansas City, Kansas, at Chute Boxe. I always trained hard, but I didn’t know what training hard was until I met this man. Back then, maybe last year, the year before that, I wouldn’t have fought for that kimura that hard. So when I got that kimura, I fought hard. I knew I was going to get it, I was confident because we drilled these so much. I just expect to see more. More knockouts. I’m 265 but I move like a lightweight. I can do 10 backflips in a row. I can almost dunk. There’s a lot of things I can do. I can throw spinning back kicks. I can do all those things. I’m just getting my feet wet. This is fun for me. I was talking to the guy the whole fight. I was telling him, ‘This is practice to me.’ Literally. He said, ‘Oh, you want to talk to me?’ I said, ‘Yeah, this is just practice.’ He’s throwing everything he had to throw, the hard shots. I went through all that. I was built for this, I was born for this, and I’m going to make a million dollars this year. I know I said that last year, some things happened, but I’m back, I don’t make excuses.”
Check out the rest of Kelvin Tiller’s post-fight presser above.
