What makes a well decorated and accomplished fighter and athlete compete past their prime to the point where it's painful for a fan to see their demise? It happened in boxing with Ali, Tyson (although he needed the money), Holyfield, Roy Jones etc. and it's happening in MMA. After watching Cro Cop's recent fight (although he won against a man wearing a diaper), what makes people like CC, Chuck Liddell, Matt Hughes, Sakuraba, and W. Silva (just to name a few) fight even though they don't need the money or the fame?
Have you ever competed in a sport before? If you truly love it, you never want to quit. Even if you aren't as great as you used to be, you still love the competition. Hell, I played for the goddamn Wizards just to keep playing.
Well many of them did need the money, Tyson and Holyfield for sure. Just because you make a lot of money does not mean you have a lot of money. Giving your money for others to mange means many times you lose it. Divorces and child support eat away at it. Bad inverstments and spending money on high end items take there toll. Many do not realize just having a good pricipal amount saved = living on that forever and having your kids and grand kids secure to me that is the meaing of rich, its not how much you make its how much you have.
The love of being the best. Of course a huge payday can entice fighters to take a fight when they shouldn't
I have and I know it's hard to let go, but fighting is different because you get punched and kicked in the face. I think it's harder to lose by KO and go the hospital than to lose a game of basketball.
It's physically harder but maybe not mentally. Who knows? I mean, yeah, losing a regular season basketball game is way easier than losing a UFC fight by knock out. But what about an NBA finals game 7?
Some of these stubborn folks are set financially. Penn and Arlovski come to mind. None of them is going to go hungry without fighting.
1. Money 2. Not knowing anything else These guys did this and only this for their whole life so when they retire its like "what now?" 3. Trying to recapture the magic. Even though some fighters are clearly done, they still feel they could do good.
I don't think they realize how far down they've gotten. They can always just say "I had an off night" or if they do recognize their decline, they think the 50% version of them is good enough if they have a good camp. It's a really hard thing to admit your time is up. This thing that made them better than everyone else and gave them an awesome life is over and it will never come back. Once they've been stars, they don't want to become just another guy. It's the same reason junkies are junkies, they can't admit it will never feel like it used to but keep trying to anyway.
