Josh Barnett looks forward to “Defending the title he never lost” against Frank Mir

josh_barnett_8-610x381-300x187

It’s been a long and storied decade since Josh Barnett was last in the Octagon. Hell, some people may forget he was in the Octagon at all, let alone a champion. But now he’s back in the UFC, after a legendary run in Pride, and less than legendary runs in Dream and Strikeforce, but that’s fine. Barnett’s history is only as tarnished as he wants it to be, and he can provide a clean slate and new chapter for himself in the UFC if he beats up Frank Mir this Saturday.

It was a decade ago Josh was unceremoniously ousted from the UFC for popping for steroids, something he’s denied the guilt of for years, but now he’s back against the TRT monster Mir, and seemingly ready to go defend his belt. Wait, huh?

“When I walk in the ring, in my mind, I’m making my first title defense. That’s the way I see it,”

“We’ve always been in different places, even when he was fighting for titles. No one ever took my belt from me, so I don’t know what belt they were swinging around, but that wasn’t the UFC heavyweight title as far as I was concerned and I was off at Pride fighting the top dudes in the world at the time.”

“I’ve come back to the UFC and the UFC is now the premier place to be for MMA,”

“At this point Frank’s best days have already occurred, but you can’t underestimate people because you set yourself up for a downfall and I don’t think of Frank as being a bad fighter. A fighter might lose ten in a row, but they got a history of winning 30 before it and any moment there could be the one fight where they manage to pull it together and come back to their championship best and it only takes one fight.”

“I think he’s very good (on the ground). He doesn’t have a very ‘jiu-jitsuesque’ style of grappling, but he’s a big dude, explosive and I believe he wrestled high school. So when it comes to grappling, there’s not a whole lot that he hasn’t seen before, but when it comes to application and putting things together, I don’t think he’s going to be able to find training partners that grapple the way I do. If it does go to the ground, I can shut down his offense and make him pay for being underneath.”

“For quite some time after Pride folded, anyone who was in the UFC got ranked higher than me and a lot of Frank’s relevancy was based on being in the UFC. I want to see how much potential there really is there by fighting him and, honestly, I don’t really care too much about rankings, but you see it and you think ‘this idiot thinks that?’ It gives you that much more motivation when you are getting your workout done.”