Alberto Del Rio reflects on MMA comeback vs. Tito Ortiz, giving up WWE belt, fighting future

It’s been two months since Alberto Del Rio made his comeback to MMA after almost a 10-year hiatus from the sport.

The former WWE champion made his return to professional fighting in December when he took on MMA legend and former UFC light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz in the main event of Combate Americas 51, which went down in Hidalgo, Texas. It was the company’s first pay-per-view event since launching in 2013.

Del Rio lost the fight via first round submission, it wasn’t his ideal way to return to MMA.

“I was very upset, and people are never going to know what goes on in the mind of a fighter or athlete after losing a fight,” Del Rio told MMA Junkie in his first interview since the fight. “You have live another battle because you have to deal with the fact that you lost in a fight, that there’s a better man than you, that you trained so hard for so many months and that wasn’t enough.

“But after processing the loss, I felt good about it because I trained hard, I gave it my all in the training camp. It was tough adapting to the cage and I think a lot of people don’t understand that it’s night and day fighting in a cage as opposed to a ring. It’s completely different.

“And all that time away from MMA and since MMA has evolved a lot when I used to fight in Japan. You could win many fights with just wrestling and ground and pound, but now everyone has a good base in wrestling, striking, and grappling. So if I would’ve came back and had more time to prepare, maybe the result would’ve been different. But I leave happy, I didn’t have any major injuries from the fight, I don’t think I looked bad against a legend like Tito Ortiz, and I leave mixed martial arts happy. I’ll just continue growing talent with Combate Americas and keep doing what we’ve been doing from the beginning.”

Del Rio couldn’t express enough how difficult the training was for Combate Americas 51. He know Ortiz won fair and clean, but wasn’t impressed with what he saw from him in the cage that night. Del Rio believes more time to prepare and a smarter approach to the fight could’ve earned him the victory.

“I think I could’ve won that fight, I really do,” Del Rio said. “I made some mistakes with the strategy. but once again the would’ve doesn’t exist. Ring rust is real and it was there. I made two big mistakes and with someone as experienced as Tito that’s deadly.”

Despite believing he could do much better in second fight now that he’s gone through a training camp, Del Rio doesn’t plan to continue fighting.

“I said it from the beginning, this was going to be one fight and that’s it,” Del Rio explained. “There was a possibility because, as you know, people in Saudi Arabia are buying everything and they wanted us to bring Combate Americas there, specifically with me fighting on that event.

“They were putting down a lot of money and like “The Godfather” said, it was an offer we couldn’t refuse. But that just stayed on the table, and since the beginning, I said I was going to do it so the company would keep growing. For me, to do my last fight was to take that stake off my chest from Japan since in my last fight I wasn’t training the way I was supposed to.’

“For this one I trained very well, but you know, Tito is someone with a lot of experience and me retiring for so long from MMA, being 14 years away from the sport that did affect me. But oh well, like I said, it was one fight and that’s it.”

The bout between Ortiz and Del Rio wasn’t a title bout, but there were still championship belts on the line. Del Rio had his WWE world title going up against Ortiz UFC light heavyweight belt.

The Mexican fighter was sad to hand his WWE belt to his foe, honoring a deal comes first.

“I still have that void because I had that belt framed and hanged on shelf,” Del Rio said. “It was very nice and it was the original, but I had to give it to him because that was the deal. I gave him my word as a man, so yeah. Right now I’m making a replica so I can have a copy, so I can at least have that memory on my wall.”

Del Rio says he’s definitely not friends with Ortiz and doesn’t plan on becoming friends with him anytime soon. They do have a professional relationship, as they’ll continue to work together for Combate Americas.

The 42-year-old leaves with a positive experience returning to MMA, and said he wouldn’t’ve wanted an easier comeback. After all Del Rio took on an active former UFC champion and one of the most experienced fighters today in MMA.

“I know who Tito is, always have, but I’m a person that likes challenges,” Del Rio said. “I took the challenge thinking I was going to win it. I’ve never taken a challenge thinking I wans’t going to do it.

“Tito is a great fighter and a great legend, and well, I’m at least happy I trained very hard to get to that fight and I gave it 100 percent. Just simply the better man won that night.”