WEC
veteran, Bryan "Kid
Lightning" Caraway, has returned to his native state
of Washington to fight this Saturday, Dec 4 at the Rumble
on the Ridge XV taking place at the Snoqualmie
Casino. Bryan, originally training out of Yakima MMA
and then with Dennis Hallman's Victory Athletics, moved to Sacramento earlier this year
with his girlfriend and fellow Pro MMA fighter, Miesha
Tate. There, they joined Urijah Faber's Team Alpha Male
and are training out of Faber's Ultimate Fitness gym with
the likes of such fighters as Urijah, Joseph Benavidez,
Danny Castillo, Chad Mendes, Justin Buchholz, and Kyacey
Uscola to name a few.
Miesha
and Bryan
Inside
the cage, Caraway
fought twice this year for the WEC, dropping his debut
fight with the organization in January when he was caught in an
armbar by Mark Hominick, and then in August he came out on
the short end of controversial split decision to Brazilian
Fredson Paixao. Caraway has since been released from his
contract with the WEC and is currently a free agent. On
Nov 30th, NW Fightscene spoke with
Bryan about his upcoming fight, his release form the WEC,
his thoughts about the fight with Paixao, and much more...
NW
Fightscene: You're going to be fighting this
Saturday...
Bryan
Caraway: Actually I was. I just found out my opponent got hurt
so I don't know what's going on now. They're trying to
scramble.
They gave me a list of like five names. I'll fight
whoever, whatever. So I'm just kind of waiting now.
NWFS: OK.
Tell us about your release from the WEC?
Caraway: I
talked to [WEC Matchmaker] Sean Shelby personally a little about possibly
cutting my contract. He said he wanted to still keep me
in there if somebody fell out or somebody got hurt. I
actually was having some management problems. The only way
I could get out underneath my
current management was basically get a new contract. I was asking him to cut me out
because I didn't
want to be stuck under that contract with my current
agent... Went
down to Vegas for a WEC card and talked to him and
he's like 'yeah, I'm just going to let you go'. Because my
last fight was kind of controversial, that's why they
wanted to keep me.. But I asked to be released because I wanted new
management.
NWFS: Lets
talk about that last fight against Fredson Paixao which
ended in a split
decision loss for you. What are
your thoughts about it now?
Caraway: I went back and watched it a bunch of times and
I don't understand how I lost. I still thought I won. Faber
thought I won... I thought I went out there and pretty much
controlled the fight. I backed him up the whole entire
time. I had complete cage control. I outboxed him ridiculously the whole first two rounds. I
don't think he hardly even
threw any punches. I took him down every single round. He
took me down once in the 2nd which I got immediately right
back up. He clearly didn't want me to get back up. I let
him up purposely on every takedown afterwards because I was outboxing him. He did land some leg kicks and a couple
of them did hurt pretty bad to be honest. But most of them,
it was that he had
such an awkward style, I didn't know what to do, to check
or to take him down. So I was kind of freezing because I could see the kick coming
and
I would try to
get out of the way at the last minute. I think the sound was making a bigger
thing [in the judges eyes] than they actually were
doing... I don't know how I lost the
fight... It is what it is.
There's a lot of bad decisions in this sport and you have
to have a short memory, move on, and win the next
fight.
NWFS: The
run in the WEC was I'm sure disappointing for you but I know you want to get back into the mix. What'd you
learn from the experience this year?
Caraway: I
learned that I just need to have more confidence in
myself. I'm in the gym and I'm competing against Faber.
I'm winning rounds against world class guys. And I have a
lot of talent, I just have to get my mental straight. This
last year I realized that I belong there and I need to not
hold back. The Fredson fight I could have pushed so much
harder. I had two or three more gears I could have clicked
up and just really pushed the pace but I figured hey, I'm winning the fight. I'm playing it safe. No need to push
the pace and go crazy, take him down and maybe get caught
in a sub because he's a six-time world champion. Just take
that factor out. I'm winning the fight cautiously. But I
realized I shouldn't do that for sure, especially if it
goes to a decision. I just need to turn it up and give 100
percent. I would have been happier if I went balls to the
wall and got caught, then lose a controversial split
decision I thought I'd won. It was kind of lackluster and
I don't want to be know for that. I want to exciting and I
want to show people what I can really do. NWFS: Originally
you
were supposed to fight Paixao in March but got injured.
What was the nature of the injury and how is it healing?
Caraway: I
hurt my knee before the Hominick fight
in my training camp. I tore my meniscus. And during the Hominick
fight, I re-hurt my knee and it was kind of
something that never went away. Right before the
Fredson fight [in March], I was in training and hurt it again. Same exact
side, same knee. I think I just re-tore the meniscus or
tore it even further and that's pretty much what
happened. Its still not the same as it was before but its
not hindering my training at all. It'll get caught every
once in awhile but your meniscus is not the most important
ligament by far. I think its as good as its going to get
right now.
NWFS: You're
at Team Alpha Male. How's that training going?
Caraway: Down there the biggest thing is that they have a ridiculous
mentality and that's why I moved there. They
have a really really strong mentality and they do a lot of
mental coaching and they have a phenomenal work ethic. And
I think with the strong mentality and the hard work ethic,
you can do anything. Urijah Faber's a multiple time world
champion, Joseph Benavidez has fought for a world title,
Chad Mendes is 4-0 in the WEC. We have guys in there that are phenomenal world class athletes that have an amazing
positive mentality and an amazing work ethic. And I heard
from everybody, Greg Jackson, Faber, Hallman that I am one of the most talented people in the world. I keep
hearing this but I need to work on my mentality and I need
to start believing in myself a little bit more. That's always kind of been the issue with myself, is that
I've been in the way of myself this whole time. I
think that down there that's the thing that is helping me
come out of my shell. Success breeds success,
confidence breeds confidence, and being around those
confident people that have a good work ethic, I think its
wearing off on me and making me feel overall more
confident.
NWFS: You and Miesha are
both in
James Z. Feng's upcoming documentary
"Fight Life". How'd that come out about and when will it
be released?
Caraway:
Me and Miesha
both fought on Strikeforce on the same card a long time
ago, and we met them [the filmmakers] there. It progressed that they
ended up getting a hold of Lyle Beerbohm because he was fighting
and I was over there doing a training camp with Lyle. They saw me and they saw
Miesha and like 'Oh Man! They're a couple' . They
didn't really put two and two together beforehand. They
started talking to us and we pretty much told them our living situation out at
Dennis [Hallman's]. We bought an RV and we
really were just saving money and really trying to focus. They
really thought we had a very interesting story that shows
how fighters sacrifice and come up through the ranks. What we have to give up and what we have to do...
It really
worked out awesomely. Hopefully that'll be coming out. I
think its been finished but they're trying to sell it to
somebody big.
[Check out
the trailer to the film HERE]
NWFS: Who
do you have sponsoring you right now?
Caraway: Urijah Faber's Form
Athletics.
They'll be sponsoring me for the fight. Nielsen's Construction,
Excavating and Landscaping.
I have One
Hit Quit
fight clothing. Always got to support
Vicious Fightgear
out of the Northwest.
Fight
University
has been a huge help to me, out of Spokane.
NWFS: Who
do you want to thank?
Caraway: I'd
like to thank my girlfriend Miesha Tate for helping support me and being there every step of
the way. I'd like to thank my new team, Team Alpha Male,
Urijah Faber, Joseph Benavidez, all Team Alpha Male and
Ultimate Fitness for being so welcoming. I want to thank
Rich Guerin, Julie Guerin and Yakima MMA for helping me out while I've been up here.
I'd like to
thank my mom for pushing me and being there for me and
helping me with my confidence, and thank my whole family. I'd like
to thank NW Fightscene and all the people helping promote
me. Last but not least I'd like to thank God. And that's
it.
Merry Christmas to everybody.
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