“I don’t know, I really don’t know,” Hendricks told Sporting News. “Whenever I rewatch the fight, it looked like I controlled most of the fight. He just had his moments. He was trying to do anything he could to try and steal a round. But everything leading to that, I was in control. Realistically, I think I just need to figure out the Vegas judges. I got to figure out what they want to see, what there looking to see out of me, what do they want out of a fighter because that’s been my kryptonite.”
“Bigg Rigg” has suffered three losses in his career, all of them in Las Vegas. One would think since those close fights didn’t go his way that Hendricks would no longer want to fight in Las Vegas.
“Here’s the thing, there’s a part of me that’d like to figure out what they want,” Hendricks said. “I like Vegas. I like fighting in Vegas. But it does get hard where that’s where all your losses are in Vegas. The last two have been really tough. It does make it hard to want to go back, but I do. I’d like to go back. I lived there for three and half years. I know some people there. I like the environment there. I like Vegas. I just wish I can win there (laughs).”
Hendricks could have waited to have the trilogy fight with Lawler and get back his championship. He passed on the opportunity as Lawler wanted to take some time off and Hendricks wanted to get back in the cage. But in facing Brown, Hendricks sees a carbon copy of Lawler and that has forced him to make some adjustments in his game to get on the road back to the belt.
“Yea,(Brown is like Lawler),” Hendricks said. “I made some adjustments. We’re still making adjustments today. There’s a lot of things we’re going to be able to improve on for that next fight. Right now, some of the things I’m doing like for example, I’m probably right at 20 percent body fat. Right now, I’m at 15 percent, maybe less today. That’s the thing I’m really looking at is now to be a complete fighter. I have to start trying to be the complete fighter. I have to live in the octagon and outside the octagon.”
Steven Muehlhausen is a boxing and MMA writer and contributor for Sporting News. You can email him at [email protected] and can find him on Twitter @SMuehlhausenMMA.
