Heavyweight “Big” Ben Rothwell returns to the ring on April 27 at KnuckleMania 4, finally getting his date under the BKFC banner with Todd Duffee.
Rothwell had been set to face off with fellow UFC alum Duffee back in December, only for an illness to take him out of the fight. Yet while having already prepared for an opponent might feel like studying for a test you’ve already taken, Rothwell told Cageside Press recently that when it comes to bare-knuckle, he doesn’t really do any studying.
“It’s just so different than an MMA fight. There’s not a lot of studying that goes into it,” admitted Rothwell. “It’s very much focused on my conditioning, what I’m going to do. My MMA fights were similar, but in this it’s 100% make my opponent worry [about] what I’m going to do. I’m not worried [about] what they’re going to do, they’re going to worry about what I’m going to do.”
“I’m a force to be reckoned with, when I come forward, I’m next to unstoppable,” added Rothwell. “The only time I f*cking have problems is when I hesitate or I back off. That’s when I had problems in my entire MMA career, and in this, when I come forward, you can’t deal with me.”
It’s been said that bare-knuckle isn’t for everyone, and that doesn’t just apply to fans. Not every fighter wants to throw down without gloves. Rothwell agrees that it takes a certain type.
“I’ll say it’s a fact. I’ve been in mixed martial arts and martial arts in general, I’ve been doing this for 25 years. There’s fighters in the UFC and doing MMA that are very successful that don’t like to get hit, and they’re very good at not getting hit. They use their wrestling, they use submissions and they can win.”
“If you force them in a situation like this where you’re going to get hit, no, they’re not going to do this. There’s fighters that have already said, even boxers that need their hands wrapped. They want no part of this. MMA fighters that don’t want to get hit, they want no part of this. There is a select group of people that do this, and Platinum [Mike] Perry and myself were tailor made for this. It’s not for everybody, and we’re a different breed of people that do do this.”
Check out our interview with BKFC KnuckleMania IV’s Ben Rothwell above.
