Ben Rothwell once generated a knockout that was so disconcerting that a tenured BKFC heavyweight who was ringside for that KO swore he would never fight Big Ben in Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship. Zach Calmus touched upon this moment on Bare Knuckle Bowker during the lead up to his fight with Corey Willis at BKFC 79 on August 2nd in Sturgis.
During the interview, 'Shark Attack' discussed his own moment at BKFC KnuckleMania 5 and how much of a setback that January loss to Pat Brady was to him overall. Also of note from BKFC's fifth annual tentpole event, Ben Rothwell secured an emphatic finish of Mick Terrill in front of a raucous Philadelphia crowd to capture the heavyweight crown on that same night that Calmus fell short to Brady.
It wasn't that performance though that imparted to Zach Calmus that he didn't want the smoke, to use the parlance of our time, with the kingpin of BKFC's heavyweight class. When getting into the specifics of his Ben Rothell anecdote in this context, Calmus said,
"That's a bad man. Ben Rothwell is a bad, bad man. A lot of people know that and a lot of people can stand by that, but not the way that I can. I was ringside when Ben fought Bobo O'Bannon. Now, his [O'Bannon's] life has obviously gone the way it's gone. That's all I have to say about that. I'm not with that, [with] those people anymore."
"But what I am gonna say is that when he got hit by Ben, that was enough for me to never fight Ben Rothwell ever. I never want to fight Ben Rothwell. He's a bad man. He's champ for a reason. When he hit him [O'Bannon], I watched the earthquake go across Bobo's head. You saw what Bobo did to me. Two of my teeth. He hit me pretty good. What I'm saying is what Ben did to Bobo was devastating."
Ben Rothwell and the most devastating bare knuckle KO that Calmus ever saw
Further delving into this ruinous fight ending moment during the UFC vet's debut in the space of heavyweight gloveless combat, Calmus stated,
"It sounded like he hit him with a hammer, like a steel hammer. I was ringside walking by and I turned my whole head. I could hear the sound of his skin ripping open when Ben hit him. That was the most devastating knockout I've ever seen in bare knuckle, Ben Rothwell. So yeah, that's something I wanted to share with people. That's the champ for a reason. You don't know how big he is and how fast he is. You're around Ben, you'll figure it out. He's a great guy but don't mess with the champ."
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