Vinc Pichel knew if he could get past Jim Miller at UFC 252, it would be the biggest win of his career.
Pichel was fighting for the first time in over a year and knew Miller would be a dangerous foe. He was worried about the first-round submission attempt and even says he was about two to three seconds from tapping or going out when Miller had him in the guillotine.
“That was a big thing for us. The first round is always the most dangerous. You aren’t sweaty, guys are fresh, they are the strongest and explosive. Jim Miller is a hard out of the gate kind of guy,” Pichel said to MMANews. “So, I just had to weather the storm, which I wasn’t too worried about it. I didn’t expect him to strike the way he did at me. I expected him to go straight for a takedown and make it a grappling match. He came to fight, just had to weather that first round and be careful getting subbed and he had me in that calf slicer, which was a bad position, but I was defending probably and he couldn’t advance the position.”
Following the win, Vinc Pichel is hoping to make a quick turnaround. Injuries have derailed his career and at 37-years-old, he knows he has to make up for the lost time
“I have time to makeup, a lot of time to catch up for,” he said. “My old a*s body is battered and bruised but this is one of the few fights I came into with not one injury. My body feels great, I have a few bumps and bruises but heal up and get another fight this year.”
With the win over Miller, Pichel is now on a two-fight winning streak and hopes a ranked opponent is next. Yet, he isn’t holding his breath on that.
Instead, for Pichel, he is more focused on staying active and making the most amount of money possible.
“I’m hoping it is but I don’t really care man. I just have a lot of time to makeup, I’m getting old in the sport. I feel great and I don’t see an end coming to my career anytime soon. That is how good I feel,” Pichel said. “I’m looking to just bust out fights and make up for long times and collect this cash I should’ve been collecting the whole time.”
One fight Pichel says he had a ton of interest in is the Al Iaquinta rematch. The two fought on The Ultimate Fighter 15 with Iaquinta winning by decision. Yet, it was an exhibition bout, so to have a rematch with the fight counting to their records make it interesting.
Unfortunately for Pichel, he says he has tried for that fight multiple times but Iaquinta is not interested.
“It is a shark tank, I don’t have anyone in mind. Honestly, I am just a violent b*****d with anger problems that will fight whenever I need to fight. I’m just looking to fight… I’ve actually been trying to fight Al Iaquinta for a long time and he has been kind of dodging me,” Pichel concluded. “So, I kind of lost interest, he knows it won’t be an easy fight for me. I’m high risk for Al. If I torment Al as I did to Jim Miller it won’t look good.”
Who would you like to see Vinc Pichel fight next?
