Last week I was contacted on my twitter by a fighter by the name of Anthony Birchak who asked if I would do an interview with him and of course I said yes. So, today I had the pleasure of having a nice phone interview with him and I just want to say that he is a real classy guy and enjoyed interviewing him. Thanks again.

Ben:

First of all, I would like to say thanks for reaching out to me and us at MMAVictor.

Anthony:

Yeah no problem. I saw you guys tweeting it up and wanted to hit you guys up and see how it was going.

Ben:

The first thing I want to do is make sure your win/loss record and current title information is correct.

Anthony:

Right now I am the current RITC (Rage in the Cage) Bantamweight Champion. I beat Carlos Ortega for that, he had the belt for a couple of years. The fight between me and him was put off for awhile. They wanted me to fight him in like June of 2010, then they put it off until November 2010, then I ended up not fighting him at all. Then finally July 4th 2011 is when we actually started fighting. That was actually one of my favorite fights.

Ben:

That sounds like that fight took awhile to get going?

Anthony:

Oh yeah man, first I got injured, then he went out of town and got injured and then back and fourth. There were little nagging injuries. I was kind of getting depressed  and was  like I’m never going to fight for the title, it was kind of annoying.

Ben:

Yeah that’s got to get tedious after awhile for sure?

Anthony:

It happens sometimes you know. When you start training so hard for a camp you start to run into all these little bumps and bruises and that’s pretty much why I say that no one fights at a %100.

Ben:

What’s your official win/loss record right now?

Anthony:

Right now, 6-1. My only loss is at 145 and that’s when I took a trip down to Brazil. I’m still undefeated at 135.

Ben:

What is your training camp now, I got you down with Team Scrub and Apex Gym with Drew Fickett and them. You still training out of there?

Anthony:

Team Scrub was like our own little union, we were fighting out of a little crappy gym with hand me down heavy bags and wrestling mats and stuff. Now, pretty much everyone has migrated over to Apex MMA, they got George Roop, Ed West, we just got Chris Cariaso from the UFC in there now. As far as my training partners and training camp goes, everybody is at either 135 or 145 and are some of the best in the weight group right now. I got a good, solid camp going right now.

Ben:

Well that’s good and that’s good you are working with a lot of the people in the same weight-class.

Anthony:

Yeah, it was good to just have Ed West and George Roop and then once we got Cariaso in, he has thrown a whole different look at us. He is a southpaw, he is kind of shorter than me and Ed West and Roop’s like what, like six foot one for 145. A lot of the guys at 125, 135, 145, they are pretty short, so it gives us a little bit more of a real look at how the opponent is going to come at us.

Ben:

And isn’t Cariaso more of a Muay thai/kickboxing guy?

Anthony:

Yeah! It’s crazy, he is super short and he’ll get his little leg up to your face like a lighting strike, it’s insane. He has really good pressure from the top as far as jiu jitsu goes, but his striking is pretty much Muay thai based.

Ben:

What got you into MMA, what made you want to pursue fighting for a living?

Anthony:

There are so many things. I have been wrestling since I was 5 years old, Greco-Roman, free-style and Collegiate. All the sudden I see my teamates at Pima like Drew Fickett, James Terry doing all this crazy stuff, James Terry and Drew Fickett actually wreslted my older brother Victor  at Pima Community College and he introduced me to all these dudes and I thought it was the greatest thing, these guys were doing crazy bareknuckle fighting. At that time, they were having me work with some of their studs, wrestling wise. They would tell my older brother, “Hey bring in your little brother to help  train one of my guys, I know he is a good wrestler.” Once I was actually wrestling at Pima, I had guys like Danny Martinez who went to the WEC, Jesses Forbes that was on a season of TUF and Jamie Varner who ended up winning a title for the WEC. For some reason, out of Pima College you have this pedigree of these fighters that are studs and it just got me thinking, “Why can’t I try it out, why can’t I be as good as these guys?” These guys were good wrestlers and I considered myself to be a talented athlete at the time. Actually when I left Pima College, me and Efrain Escudero ended up wrestling at Grand Canyon University together and that was the season he ended up getting on TUF and winning that season. So that made me want to train a bit, I moved back down to Tucson, linked up with Fickett and we started doing jui jitsu and stuff, training a little bit more seriously and after everything I was like why not you know, everybody is doing it. It was like a bandwagon thing and I think I jumped on at the right time.

Ben:

I have noticed all your wins besides one have been by submission.

Anthony:

Yeah and I’m trying to keep that thing going too. I just really took kind of liking to the jui jitsu team. You know, a lot of wrestlers don’t like be on their back and for some reason I have no trouble sitting there waiting and being patient for an arm to pop up or a neck to pop up. The only one I did not finish was that title fight against Carlos Ortega. I want to have some sort of a record in mma for one submission only. That is one of my goals.

Ben:

And how long did you say you have been training?

Anthony:

I made my debut July 4th 2009 at RUF for a small promotion.

Ben:

Do you have a next opponent or fight set up?

Anthony:

I’m actually fighting this weekend on the 28th in Vermont against John Green. He is another wrestler/submission type guy. I think our styles will match up quite well. And I want to make sure that if anyone that wants to watch the fight, it will be on mmamadhouse.com and you will be able to stream it live.

Ben:

How do you feel about your next opponent?

Anthony:

I think it’s going to be tough. He is dropping down from 145. He has the title right now for the Amateur league right now at 145. He looks like he is going to be one of those corn-fed, cocky white boys that I have basically wrestled my whole life and I’m like this shinny rail of a kid. I think it’s going to a good match-up. Usually when you get two wrestlers together, you’re either going to see a really boring glorified grappling match or your going to see them stand in the pocket and bang it out.

Ben:

I was going to say, I’ve seen wrestlers where it just turns into a striking match.

Anthony:

Exactly! More often times that not that’s what you’ll end up seeing is these two wrestlers that don’t want to go to the ground and want to give the fans a show, so they’ll sit there and slug it out. I have no problem doing that, I love the stand-up game. That’s what I have been working on. That has been the biggest whole in my game for the longest time. Working with Ed West, my strikes have improved by leaps and bounds and I really want to showcase the stand-up game I got.

Ben:

Well, I’m glad you’re training in all areas. Like you can be good in one area for so long, if you’re not an all around MMA fighter then you’re not going to last that long.

Anthony:

Yeah exactly, unfortunately. Look at what happened to Chad Griggs this past weekend. If you’re not ready to go to the ground and haven’t worked on your ground work, it’s more like inevitable that you’re going to meet your untimely end. He just doesn’t have that many Heavy-weights to train with here in Tucson to help push him on a daily basis. I know his two Heavy-weight training partners and he needs to be seeing different looks constantly.

Ben:

Maybe a higher level of training?

Anthony:

Exactly. A higher level of constant/variations of looks and he is not getting that right now. Hopefully he will see that and maybe make a move up to Phoenix to The Lab or something. I think if Chad made it to Power MMA he would have a huge growth spurt in the sport and his game will evolve.

Ben:

Without giving anything away, do you have any predictions for your next fight?

Anthony:

Honestly, I don’t. I just want to come out and stick some leather in his face. I want to pressure him, I want him to shoot-in you know. I have been a wrestler my whole life, I know how to counter a wrestler, I know how to stop a wrestler. Vice versa he knows how to do the same thing, it’s just how are we going to set each other up to get the win. I definitely want to let the gloves fly and hopefully put him on his ass.

Ben:

Do you have a favorite technique or move you like to do or do you like to just train everywhere and see where the fight goes?

Anthony:

As far as my favorite move? I always seem to find the Darce choke. Even my training partners say, “We know it’s coming, we just don’t know when it’s coming.” I just seem to always find the Darce. When I was in Bellator, I finished the dude with a Darce, I finish pretty much all my grappling matches in practice with a Darce or some variation of an anaconda choke. I have really long arms and work with what I got.

Ben:

Do you have any mentors or inspirations?

Anthony:

My little brother, he just signed with Eastern Washington University for football, he’ll call me on some days during this camp where I was just beaten up and I was kind of taking the morning off or something and he is always busting my balls, like, “What did you do to get better today? Like did you get better at all today?” He just me makes feel so guilty (laughs). He pushes me a lot, he is a tremendous athlete, my older brother is a tremendous athlete. They have always inspired me to be better and definitely they have made their mark in my career.

Ben:

Do you have a favorite fighter, besides yourself ha-ha?

Anthony:

Bj Penn and Fedor are two of my idols that I was looking up to. There are so many now that are my favorites,t he way Carlos Condit moves impresses me. Rory MacDonald! I am Rory MacDonald fan right now, that kid is amazing.

Ben:

They are saying he is going to be the next GSP, I think he is going to be the first Rory MacDonald.

Anthony:

Exactly. I hate it when people say that. I hate when people say this guy is going to be the next so and so. I mean, he is obviously doing it his own way, that’s that man and nobody else.

Ben:

On a company/personal level our way, have you ever heard of MMAVictor fantasy MMA?

Anthony:

I see a lot of things on twitter, the mma world, different blog sites and other things. I saw the name Ben McPhee and thought it sounded familiar, but I see so many twitter handles/names and wanted to see what you guys were doing and wanted to get some more exposure for this up and coming fight.

Ben:

Did you want to talk anymore about your fight on Saturday or anything else you want to say about anything?

Anthony:

Yeah, not to put this fight down, but I want everyone to watch my June 2nd fight against Roman Salazar. I’m not looking past John Green, but this is going to be one of the best fights Arizona has ever seen. Me and Roman are actually really good friends, I have a ton of respect for the guy, he is a great athlete and he is a great person. Those are the kind of people I like to fight, not someone who likes to run their mouth and talk a lot of shit. If this fight plays out, it will be one of those stand-up wars.

Ben:

And where is that fight?

Anthony:

June 2nd Downtown Phoenix at the Phoenix Convention Center. It’s a for a league called Coalition of Combat. If you guys look them up on facebook, they have a PPV offer for their fights. They put on a good show and this is barely their second event. I’m super excited to be able to fight for them.

Ben:

Is there anybody you want to mention or thank or any sponsors you want to thank/mention?

Anthony:

Yeah, I want to thank Jaco Clothing, Contract Killer, Kimpel and Gonzalez Adjusting, Gamma Labs, Confrontational Will Clothing, Primate Fight Gear, Masodon Mouthguards, E7 Graphics, North Side BJJ, Oren Hodak at KO Reps Sports Agency and Mercedes White with Luta Elite Sports.

Ben:

Well, I want to say good luck on your up and coming fights, good luck Saturday and if you need anything else, if you want a post fight interview or anything let me know.

Anthony:

Yeah, if you could blow up my twitter @abirchakMMA and my facebook fan page that would be great.

I personally want to thank Anthony Birchak for spending some time with us and wish him good luck in his future endeavours.

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