Are we back in the Stone Age? I think not, it’s just David “The Caveman” Rickels who has taken on his moniker and gone full Caveman on us.
Rickels is set to square off in his very first five round fight this Wednesday evening at Bellator 97 against Michael Chandler for the promotions lightweight championship.
David “The Caveman” Rickels has his minds eye on the prize
To get him to this point, the 24-year-old has gone on a four-fight winning streak. Three of those victories were in the Bellator Season 8 Lightweight Tournament. In the quarter-finals he defeated Lyle Woodard and in the semi-finals he beat Jason Fisher. Both of which came by unanimous decision.
The tournament finals went down at Bellator 94 – where Rickels stepped inside the cage with Saad Awad. Many believed Awad would come in to this fight and knock Rickels out, but this wasn’t the case. Awad utilized his wrestling prowess and took Rickel’s down almost at will for the entire first round. The second round was much of the same, that was until “The Caveman” decided to bounce to his feet and land a flurry of punches which ultimately ended the bout and earned him the tournament championship.
I kept thinking, ‘what the hell this guy’s supposed to knock me out. Why in the hell are we on the ground?’ I kept getting frustrated by that, I really thought we were going to end up trading in the fight a lot more and we’d get in to a little bit of trading and then he’d take me down. I think I was just getting frustrated and then I found my opportunity to get some strikes in.That’s really the caveman way; make it happen man. I would say most all my fights I lose a round. I lose a round and then I win, so I find a way and I adapt really well.
Chandler is arguably one of the best lightweight fighters outside of the UFC. He is undefeated in his mixed martial arts career at 11-0 and has beaten some of the top names in Bellator, such as Eddie Alvarez, Akihiro Gono and Rick Hawn. Does this phase Rickels? Not one bit, in fact he feels that he is one of the best fighters out there as well.
I think he’s that good, but the great thing about that is, I believe I’m that good also. I think that there are a lot of fighters outside of the UFC that don’t get the credit they deserve and I think I’m one of them. That’s exactly what I plan to prove tomorrow (Wednesday) is that, ‘hey look here’s this guy who’s also pretty damn good.
One of “The Caveman’s” main sponsors is the supplement company Onnit. By far their best selling and most recognized product is Alpha Brain, a complete balanced nootropic which many believe give you some crazy lucid dreams. Rickels detailed one of those dreams and in his mind he couldn’t decipher whether it was a dream or reality.
I actually had a glorious, glorious livid dream where I won the belt; It was weird. It was a dream where I was actually in my hometown and I remember that’s what I kept thinking, ‘this fight isn’t supposed to be in my home town.’ I went out there, I beat him up, I won the belt and then all of my friends started shooting pitbulls. It was really weird, because they were attacking us. So it was a really weird dream, but it was super vivid. Those are the type of dreams that I have when I use my Alpha Brain and also my New Mood.
In the dream, Rickels saw himself defeating Chandler and taking home the Bellator lightweight championship. This is not far fetched in his mind either and the fashion in which he thinks he will finish the fight is very vivid as well.
TKO, I think this is going to be a gruelling fight. We’re both tough guys that don’t want to lose and I think it’s going to be hard to break either of us mentally. When you get two tough hammers that are going to hammer on each other and no one wants to be the nail, those are the kind of fights that make great fights. That’s the kind of thing that I expect, is us to kind of beat the crap out of each other.
Make sure you check out Chandler vs. Rickels live on SPIKE TV this Wednesday July 31 and catch the prelims live right here on MMASucka.com beginning at 2:30pm PT/5:30pm ET.
To listen to the entire interview with David “The Caveman” Rickels be sure to listen to this week’s episode of MMASucka Radio HERE.
