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All of us have had our share of alcohol-fuelled adventures, some more rambunctious than others. They could range from the innocuous, like hitting on a girl at a bar, to the near-fatal, like re-enacting the "I'm the king of the world" scene from Titanic on the ledge of a 30-storey building.
The prescribed amount of alcohol to stay on cloud nine varies from individual to individual, but once that line is crossed, the human mind becomes less restrained. Long-suppressed feelings and thoughts come gushing to the surface. A drunken rant against an ex-girlfriend might actually be very therapeutic, but what if that's not the worst thing someone's experienced?
What if it's the burden of thousands of hours of battering your body and mind, and then doing it in full view of millions of people? Difficult to process, isn't it? Well, that one line doesn't do infinitesimal justice to the life of a professional mixed martial artist. Fighters are after all human, but the hidden cost of celebrity is having all your faults magnified to the public.
There have been many instances of fighters losing control, some of them being just mischief while others were dire. Here are a few from both ends of the spectrum:
#5 Rampage Jackson drunk dials Ariel Helwani early in the morning
Rampage Jackson and Ariel Helwani's beef is one of MMA's more facetious ones, not as notorious as Dana White-Tito Ortiz or Jacob Volkman-Barack Obama. Which is surprising considering Helwani's ability to get under people's skin and Rampage's lack of a filter.
If you've followed their exchanges, you can't help but be facetious about their love-hate relationship. Helwani's tenacity for the truth has revealed tales from Rampage's life that are compelling, like reportedly being cheated out of millions by his manager and claims that Michael Bisping's anti-doping invective is like the pot calling the kettle black. But it's instances like this that stand out in fans' minds and create a canopy of humour that defines their equation.
In the wee hours of October 6th, 2015, a drunk Rampage Jackson called Ariel Helwani because his followers on the gaming stream Twitch told him to! His first call went to Helwani's voicemail, which only spurred the former UFC light heavyweight champion on and he called again. A sleepy-voiced Helwani picked up this time and was treated to Rampage's version of birds chirping in the morning. Here's the recording which contains a weird reference to Jewish balls, Rampage telling Helwani to get a nose job and him picking Jose Aldo over Conor McGregor ahead of their fight at UFC 194. Have a listen:
#4 Chris Leben urinated on Jason Thacker's bed during The Ultimate Fighter
Many words were used to describe Chris Leben during his stay on The Ultimate Fighter, not all of them pleasant, but "watchable" was definitely one amongst them. The Crippler's drunken shenanigans hold the distinction of being the first in The Ultimate Fighter's long and chequered legacy of such incidents.
In the very first episode of the inaugural season, Leben got smashed and in his own words "spritzed" on teammate Jason Thacker's bed, before spreading it all over with his own hand. Leben's run on the show wasn't edifying; he was eliminated in his first tussle by Josh Koschek, got a bye into the semi-final because Nate Quarry got injured and was beaten by Kenny Florian.
When Thacker watched the show, he was left fuming after seeing what Leben had done and demanded a match. They faced each other in the live finale of the show, where Leben stopped Thacker with strikes in the first round.
Leben would have mixed fortunes in the years to come, notching up wins against the likes of Patrick Cote, Yoshihiro Akiyama and Wanderlei Silva, while coming up short against future stars Anderson Silva, Michael Bisping and Uriah Hall. Life outside the octagon was pockmarked by substance addiction and he also had a couple of DUIs against his name.
The tortured warrior with the punk pink hair would overcome his struggles with alcohol and painkillers after his retirement. A comeback with Bellator in 2016 was dashed after a life-threatening abnormality in the left ventricle of his heart was discovered. Leben lives in Oahu, Hawaii, where he passes on his knowledge to the next generation of fighters. He also hosts his own radio show called "Unfiltered MMA Radio".
#3 Jesse Taylor
It doesn't take a lot for success to go your head. Jesse Taylor is living proof of that. "JT Money" was a member of season 7 of The Ultimate Fighter, which bucked the trend of having 16 fighters each in two different weight classes and instead featured 32 Middleweights.
Against the odds, Taylor made it to the finals by winning four fights, two of which were by rear naked choke. But then, just before the finale, footage surfaced of a wasted Jesse Taylor kicking out the window of a limousine from the inside, before proceeding to terrorize a hotel lobby. Taylor was seen in the video harassing women and boasting to hotel security that he was a UFC fighter, which he wasn't.
It wasn't the first time Taylor got inebriated and went over the edge - he had pissed his pants on camera after a night of drinking on the show. But this was the last straw. Dana White judged that he wasn't mentally prepared to deal with the pressure of being a UFC fighter and removed him from the finale. A contrite Taylor contacted the UFC boss later and received a second chance, but that fight against CB Dollaway would end in a submission loss and Taylor was shown the door.
Jesse Taylor would direct his own Cinderella story by winning season 25 of the show that had brought had taken him to the highest of highs and then plunged him to the lowest of lows. Aptly titled The Ultimate Fighter: Redemption, the show featured noteworthy past contestants. Taylor choked out Dhiego Lima in the finale to win a place on the UFC roster.
In October, Taylor was suspended by USADA for a year for doping.
#2 Cody Garbrandt
Remember that time you bunked school and went out with your friends, got spotted by someone and came back home to find your mom looking like a firing squad? This is a lot like that.
Cody Garbrandt's incredible defeat of Dominick Cruz at UFC 207 swung the spotlight back on the Bantamweight division. The UFC harnessed that momentum and the bad blood between No Love and former champ TJ Dillashaw to set up The Ultimate Fighter: Redemption. The friends-turned-foes coached opposing teams and as is tradition, were scheduled to fight at the finale. But a serious back injury to Garbrandt scratched out that plan and no doubt left Dillashaw fuming.
Garbrandt chronicled his rehab, posting a video of him flying to Germany to receive cutting-edge treatment. But after that, another video surfaced, where the "injured" Garbrandt and teammate Danny Castillo are wrestling with each other, obviously drunk:
After coming upon the video, Dillashaw, composed and articulate as ever, had this to say:
"I’ve seen him drunk and wrestling around with his buddies while his back is supposedly hurt doing rehab. There are some posts that I got tagged in or got sent to me when I woke up one morning, of him getting all drunk with his buddies and him getting into a full-blown wrestling match on the ground with Danny Castillo. It’s kind of crazy. If it was hurting you to walk, and you couldn’t take the title fight, then you should probably be doing some rehab."
Left stranded without a title fight that he had most certainly trained hard for, Dillashaw called out Flyweight P4P king Demetrious Johnson, to no avail.
Well, things came full circle for Dillashaw at UFC 217, where he finished Garbrandt to reclaim the throne. During the post-fight interview, without missing a beat, Dillashaw once again threw down the gauntlet at Demetrious Johnson. Fight fans will be licking their lips to see that epic clash.
#1 Jon Jones
Being the youngest champion in a sport - any sport - brings with it immeasurable baggage; just ask Mike Tyson. But it was jarring, nevertheless, when media reported that Jon Jones had crashed his $190,000 Bentley into a pole in the wee hours of May 19th, 2012. He had been crowned the youngest champion in UFC history a little over a year earlier, aged 23.
Jones was arrested on suspicion of driving while intoxicated and pleaded guilty. He avoided jail time but had his driving license suspended for six months, had to install breathalyzers (ignition interlock - a device that prevents a vehicle from starting if the driver has been drinking) in all his vehicles and was fined $1000.
Some would call this portentous; three years later, Jones was arrested for a hit-and-run, an incident that blew the lid off his debaucherous lifestyle. His legacy in the octagon up until then was side by side with the greats of the sport. But testing positive for banned substances would leave it stained, and his redemption story was decapitated when he was stripped of the title after knocking out Daniel Cormier earlier this year. It is not known, if at all when he will return to the octagon.
