Chael Sonnen has suggested that “Big” John McCarthy should not rise above his station, in response comments made in relation to his Bellator 170 headline fight with Tito Ortiz.
Sonnen, seemingly pushing for a rematch with Ortiz, claimed that the “Huntington Beach Bad Boy” “verbally submitted” before submitting “The American Gangster” at the recent event.
McCarthy had taken to Twitter in response to Sonnen’s comments, suggesting that the UFC’s fomrer king of trash talking was fabricating such claims:
Chael must have been listening to a different frequency then the rest of the world that night. Tito didn't say anything #AskBJM https://t.co/mlIf7nbOpO
— Big John McCarthy (@JohnMcCarthyMMA) February 24, 2017
Chael Sonnen recently appeared on the “Phonebooth Fighting” podcast, which was recorded at the L.A Comedy Club in Las Vegas. The former title challenger stated:
“I love John, and I respect John, but I don’t know what that would help.”
“One, I don’t know if he felt he needed to defend himself. And, two, if there’s a major fire burning for a rematch with me and Tito, why somebody who has nothing to do with the business would come in and put any kind of water on that, or who that is to help, is beyond me.”
McCarthy’s insistence that Ortiz had not “verbally tapped” clearly got to Sonnen, who opined that the popular referee should stay out of the way:
“We’ve seen some people that we really like in this industry that are no longer in this industry, from the great Burt Watson – and Stitch Duran is still in the business, but not in the same spot he was – up to the executive director in (Nevada) state, Keith Kizer,” Sonnen said. “One thing that does happen with some gentlemen is that they want to be the star of the show, and that can get you in real trouble when you’re talking about (fights), because this is a television show as much as it is a sport. And when the executive producers are looking to push very specific people in their very expensive time slots and other guys are trying to come in and get any level of notoriety, it’s going to piss people off fast.”
