Midnight Mania! Perry To Fight Journalists, Emulate Naruto, And Kiss His Corner

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC

Bringing you the weird and wild from the world of MMA each and every weeknight!

Welcome to Midnight Mania!

Before we get to the latest in Mike Perry Madness, allow me to reveal a bit of behind-the-scenes info about Midnight Mania. Most days, I put together the body of the post in the afternoon. However, I wait until an hour or two before midnight to find the lead story, just in case anything particularly pressing goes down at 11:30 P.M.

Tonight, I’m scouring the MMA world for any news that has yet to make its way to our front page. There’s a quote from Antonio Rogerio Nogueira about retiring after his rubber match with “Shogun” Rua. That’s something, but also hardly a shock given “Lil Nog” is roughly 95 years old. Really, the vast majority of potential headlines were all shockingly bizarre Mike Perry quotes from today’s media interviews, most of which are unrelated to each other.

Without further ado, here are the best/craziest Perry statements of the last 24 hours:

On Desired Corner Advice From His Girlfriend
“Peace and quiet to hear [Gall’s] corner. I don’t ever hear nothing of value, bro… Maybe I’m not listening or something but I just feel like, ‘OK, if I ain’t going to listen anyways, why the f— should they be here and get any of the credit?’” (CBS Sports)

“I think I’m the one with experience, and I know how it should go. I just want to feel good. She’s going to be there to feel good, make me look good. If it even goes to the second round, it’s because I want her to have time to talk to me in the corner. I want her to give me a kiss and tell me to go get ‘em.” (MMAFighting)

On Motivation
“[Latory Gonzalez] is new motivation, the best motivation and the motivation I’ve been looking for my whole life. What does a guy fight for? Deep down, the animalistic features we have say that ‘if I could beat that guy and bite his neck before he bites mine, I get to take the pretty girl home.’” (CBS Sports)

On Critics
“I’m happy with telling all you losers to go f*ck yourselves,” he said (MMAFighting). “It makes me happy. I might not necessarily be talking to you. If that offends you, you must be a loser. You must be going to f*ck yourself, because if it doesn’t pertain to you, then it shouldn’t affect you, right?”

On Journalists
“Because I’ll beat your ass, that’s why,” Perry said (CBS Sports). “You run your mouth and I’ll beat your ass. You’re a journalist, you ain’t going to do shit to me. I’ll punch you in the mouth and get away with it.”

On Mentality
“I watched a lot of episodes of ‘Naruto’. I watched the whole three seasons of the ‘Avatar The Airbender’. That was good for mental training. I walked around Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure.” (MMAJunkie)

So, uh, there you have it. We should fully expect Mike Perry to Naruto-run his way to the Octagon on Saturday, pummel Mickey Gall, and then assault whatever poor soul tries to interview him post-fight.

Sounds pay-per-view (PPV) worthy!

Insomnia

An in-depth look at UFC’s COVID-19 testing procedures ahead of their journeys to Fight Island.

Sean O’Malley’s family’s reaction to his crazy walk-off knockout is pretty cool:

Daniel Cormier is training with three-time NCAA wrestling champion Alex Dieringer ahead of his Stipe Miocic rubber match. It’s time to wrestle!

Michael Chandler’s scrambling is top-notch. There’s for sure an alternate reality where he transitioned from Bellator to UFC back in like 2014 and captured the title.

Anthony Johnson responds to Dana White’s “disappearance” comment by … not really responding at all.

Slips, rips, and KO clips

There is definitely an art to checking kicks. Merely lifting the leg — as the fighter does below — often turns a kick to the thigh into a calf kick, which is perhaps even more devastating. Turning the shin/knee to face the kick is essential!

When trading right hands, the person who takes their head off the center line almost always wins!

Always fun when someone lands a slick uppercut in MMA:

Random Land

This painting video and the power of perspective is really neat.

Midnight Music: Every so often, I go back and keep working through the Billboard No. 1 hits.

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.