CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In the summer of 2005, Dana White said in an interview that as long as he was president, Tito Ortiz would never fight in the UFC again. But apparently there were other people interested in me.
My manager, pretty much in name only, stepped in and was going back and forth with the UFC. I was not surprised that Jim Gallow’s negotiations with Dana were not going anywhere. I might as well have been negotiating myself, which, in a sense, I was.
In the meantime, the WFA still wanted to sign me. But then it turned out that the UFC was negotiating anUltimate Fighter series with Spike TV, and a lot of people were telling the executives at Spike TV that they ought to be signing me because I would be great on television.
Word got back to Dana White and the UFC and it put a lot of pressure on them. I’m not going to lie to you and say I wasn’t having a good time watching Dana and the UFC squirm. They wanted me signed, and it really seemed like they were losing the public relations war. At that point, I was seriously thinking about signing with the WFA and screwing Dana White and the UFC.
Sure, I wanted more money, but the big thing I was pushing for on my new contract was the very thing I had to give up on my last contract, which was owning my own image. I wanted a piece of whatever they were making off my name and likeness.
The whole time I had been away, support from fans and people whose opinion meant something to the UFC had been growing. They finally looked at the bottom line and at the number of people who supported me and realized that they couldn’t let me go.
Especially to a competing organization.
So they grudgingly signed me to a three-fight deal. I got an extra $50,000 per fight and a bigger piece of the pay-per-view income. I got a percentage of my own image and I was given theUltimate Fighter series season-three coaching position. I had finally gotten my way on the two most important deal points of the contract—more money and the rights to my likeness. Negotiating for a role in theUltimate Fighter show was gravy, and I saw it as a great way to get the word out on the sport. The first two seasons had done real well and with the backing of Spike TV, it was a given that the third season would be a smash—and I wanted in.
So part of my new deal was to be one of theUltimate Fighter trainers. I asked Dana if we could get Ken Shamrock to be the other trainer. I thought Shamrock would be good on a competitive level, and I felt that he and I should fight at the conclusion of the season. It would be a good build for the show because I knew Ken was a good fighter and that he could talk smack.
Ken and I met before the beginning of the season. It was a bit tense. We had never really gotten along and we had talked a lot of smack. So putting us together in this type of situation could be asking for trouble. But I went up to him at the beginning of the season and said, “You know, we’re here for a job and to see who’s the best coach. I’m going to respect your space as long as you respect mine.” He agreed. During the entire run of the show, I never said anything to him or so much as looked at him wrong.
We shot thirteen episodes in six weeks. A lot of people thought I was acting and playing to the camera, but that wasn’t the case at all. I just used my skills as a coach and a trainer. Every guy who I picked for my team was a guy that I wanted. I don’t think a lot of guys wanted to be on Shamrock’s team; they clearly wanted to be on mine. Once we started training, I was beginning to think that Shamrock didn’t really know what he was doing. I put my guys through all-around testing, while Ken just tested to see who was the strongest guy.
Once the actual matches began, I started talking a little bit of smack. My team ended up winning nine of the twelve matches and after each win I would turn to him and say, “How does that feel? You must be doing something wrong.” I know that got under his skin. The big issue during the filming of the series was that they wanted me to talk more shit to Shamrock, but I wouldn’t. For me this was a great learning experience, and talking a lot of smack was not what this was about.
TheUltimate Fighter series did a lot for me. People were used to seeing the Bad Boy in the Octagon. They hadn’t had a chance to see me as a coach and more of a person.
My first fight after completing theUltimate Fighter series was to be against a previousUltimate Fighter series winner, Forrest Griffin. Griffin was a solid fighter and a good guy. He was aggressive and had nothing to lose. I had everything to lose, so I knew this was going to be a tough first fight. I knew he would come out swinging for the fences.
I went up to Big Bear to train. But the truth was, I knew I shouldn’t have been fighting.
I was having a lot of physical problems. I still had issues with that bulging disk in my back and a torn ACL, I still had some problems from the back injuries from when I fought Couture, and I also had a knee that was giving me problems.
There was the usual pre-fight hype and a bit of trash talking. A lot of people did not see this as a very competitive fight, and Dana White was doing his best to drum up interest, saying things like “Forrest Griffin is a better fighter than Tito Ortiz ever was” and stuff like that. But I didn’t hold anything personal against Forrest. I was convinced that I was going to go out and beat his ass.
I wasn’t a hundred percent. I was only training a couple of days a week and I was in no shape at all. But I did spend a lot of time thinking about what the T-shirt for this fight should say. I finally realized that this wasn’t about Forrest or the fight; this was about me. Finally I came up with something.
The fight with Forrest Griffin was called UFC 59: Reality Check. Because of physical problems, the fight was close. In the first round, I just dominated. I took him down and punished the shit out of him. But I blew my wad in the first round and so, in the second round, I was a little tired. In the third round I was totally gassed until the last minute and a half. Then I got a takedown and won the round and the match.
I put on the shirt. A lot of people were expecting a putdown of Forrest. But what they got instead was: “With Great Sacrifice Comes Great Rewards.” It was a T-shirt for me, and I felt that I deserved it.
My second fight with Ken Shamrock was being billed as a grudge match of sorts. I don’t know why. I was always talking smack about the guy, but I did not really hate him or anything. I guess it was just the normal buildup to a fight in order to put people in the seats.
I fought Shamrock on July 8, 2006. It was billed as UFC 61: Bitter Rivals. It really wasn’t much of a fight unless you were rooting for me.
I got him down and elbowed him in the face a bunch of times, and the referee stopped it at 1:23 of the first round. Shamrock complained about the stoppage after the fight. All I could say was, “Just look at the tape of the fight.” The tape showed that he had been knocked unconscious.
My T-shirt that night was quite simply a statement of fact: “If You Fight Tito Ortiz You Lose!”
But he still continued to complain about how he had been robbed. I told him, “If you didn’t think I kicked your ass, we can do it again.” The third fight between us, Ortiz vs Shamrock 3: The Final Chapter, was held on September 10, 2006. It was on Spike TV, and we had something like ten million viewers.
There was the usual hype and trash talking. I liked Ken Shamrock even less now. A lot of what passes for trash talking is pretty humorous sometimes, but I can honestly say that by the time we got around to that third fight, I was really pissed off at him.
Ken came out and tried to take me down. I muscled him into the cage. He tried for my leg and missed. That’s when I got him up against the cage and just started punching him. I stopped him at 2:45 of the first round. And yes, I knocked him unconscious.
Shamrock and I have had our words over the years, and to this day we’re not the best of friends. But we embraced after that fight and I think, to a degree, we buried the hatchet.
Although I did manage to get in one final shot with the T-shirt I wore that night: “Punishing Him Into Retirement.”
The third fight with Shamrock marked the end of my current contract with the UFC. By then I did not have management or an attorney. Dana was being all nice to me now and he reminded me that I was making good money. I had to agree.
I was back on the hot seat again.
I told Dana, “Look, I’m going to trust you completely. Give me the contract and I’ll sign it and send it back to you.” It must have killed Dana to give me the contract that he did. He gave me a $200,000 signing bonus and raised my fee to a full million dollars a fight.
Given my relationship with Dana and the bad blood that was growing between us, a lot of people thought I was crazy to take his offer. It was kind of a ballsy move. But I knew that at the end of the day, business is business and that Dana White and the UFC had a lot to lose if they screwed me over on this contract.
I signed the agreement and was back in business with the UFC.