411 MMA Interviews: Gilbert Melendez
Posted by Jeffrey Harris on 04.06.2010
The undisputed Strikeforce Lightweight Champion speaks with 411mania for an exclusive interview before his upcoming blockbuster title bout against Shinya Aoki on April 17. "El Niño" talks his training and preparation for Aoki, fighting in Pride, his losses, and much more.
Gilbert "El Niño" Melendez (17-2) once again became the undisputed Lightweight Champion of Strikeforce by avenging one of his only two career losses against Josh Thomson (the man who defeated Melendez for the belt) last December in what many consider to be one of the best fights of the year. It was a five round war. As of now, Melendez is preparing for another title fight and possible 5 round war against one of the top ranked lightweight fighters in the world, Shinya Aoki, the Lightweight Champion of the DREAM organization. The winner of this fight will arguably be the #2 lightweight fighter in the world.
Earlier this month, 411mania got the chance to sit down and speak with Gilbert to talk about making the fight with Aoki and his preparation leading up to the fight as well as Gilbert's most recent rise back to the top of the lightweight division in Strikeforce.
Jeffrey Harris: How excited are you that this fight with Shinya Aoki is finally happening?
Gilbert Melendez: I'm very excited this fight is happening. It came out of nowhere. I asked for it and I got it. It's a little bit nerve-wracking just having it all on CBS, having it against Shinya Aoki. It all happened really fast. I get a little bit nervous but more than anything, it's good nerves, I'm excited, and it's my coming out party.
Jeffrey Harris: This is a huge fight. And after Strikeforce announced the co-promotional deal with DREAM last summer and you beat Mitsuhiro Ishida, this is probably the fight a lot of fans were really talking about and salivating over at the prospect of cross-promoted fights between Strikeforce and DREAM fighters. I'm very excited about this fight. How do you feel you match up with Aoki who is very good on the ground? He's a very a good grappler. He's got good takedowns, wrestling, and excellent submissions.
Gilbert Melendez: I think he's #2 in the world for a reason. So I mean I am nervous fighting the guy. He is a great wrestler. He's a great judo guy. He's got great submissions. And he poses a lot of threats. But I believe I pose a lot of threats to him as well. I match up well with him. I think he's a very intelligent fighter and he's very smart, but I am as well. And I think he hasn't fought an aggressive fighter that's as smart as me and as patient as me. So I think I match up well with him and it makes for a great match. I'm also pretty confident in my grappling skills. Obviously I don't want to be grappling with him, but if it does go there I believe I can hold my own. I mean he's obviously better but I think I can hold my own and do pretty good in MMA.
Jeffrey Harris: Aoki is used to fighting in his long tight pants and he's used to fighting in a ring. You've fought in a ring as well as a cage. Do you think your experience fighting in a cage and fighting in title bouts for 5 rounds in a cage, do you think that gives you an edge over Aoki?
Gilbert Melendez: I mean I hope so. I'm not counting on any sort of edges or any sort of advantages to getting it through this fight or depending on them. But yeah, I mean it may bother him, it may not. I'm not counting on it. I'm not counting on him being jetlagged. I'm not counting on him you know not being able to wear his pants or not being able to fight in the ring. I'm not really counting on nothing. It could be a disadvantage to him. I really don't know. It's up to him. But yeah, I just can't even really count on that kind of stuff.
Jeffrey Harris: I think even though Aoki is widely considered the #2 lightweight fighter in the world, I think you are definitely up there. You've beaten some tough and strong individuals like Clay Guida, Tatsuya Kawajiri another top ranked lightweight fighter who you beat in Pride over in Japan in 2006. So I think you're definitely a top ranked guy, wouldn't you agree?
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah, thank you, I appreciate that. Yeah I beat you know you got some good points there. I believe I am one of the top ranked guys. Right now man, 155 is so stacked. I mean there's 20 guys out there that could be top 5 on any given day. If they had a 155 lb tournament and they had a 20 man bracket, you know, you can guarantee there'd be a lot of upsets and a lot of surprises.
Jeffrey Harris: Congratulations by the way, you are now a 2-time undisputed Strikeforce Lightweight Champion. You became the undisputed champion again by defeating Josh Thomson last December. How did that feel to kind of go down that road and after we thought we might not even see that rematch again, how gratifying was it for that to finally happen?
Gilbert Melendez: Oh dude, it felt so great. It was one of the best moments of my life. I go into a lot of fights not really too nervous, even against Shinya here I'm not too nervous . . . when I went against Josh, I knew I was going into a crazy war and that's what it turned out to be, a crazy war and it felt really good. I'm really proud of myself and I'm glad I'm the champ again. Yeah, big stress reliever and I'm ready to move forward.
Jeffrey Harris: You and Josh seem to match up really well and have some great fights. Now that the two of you are 1-1, would you ever see a rubber fight with you and Thomson somewhere down the line?
Gilbert Melendez: Honestly, right now I really wouldn't want to fight Josh, but I think it's gonna happen. It's gonna have to happen and we're going to have to do a tie-breaker. And I'm sure it will happen here in the day. Hopefully, we can just get paid handsomely for it and maybe one day he'll work up the rankings there, and we'll both work up, and maybe it will be #2 vs. #1 in the world, #3 in the world, #4 in the world, who knows? But yeah I think we're going to have to do it for the fans.
Jeffrey Harris: I think this is without question the biggest fight of your career. I think this is the biggest stage you've ever fought on before at least broadcast wise. And Aoki is one of the best in the world, so is there anything you are doing to prepare for Aoki? Any changes to your training camp or anyone you are bringing to prepare for Aoki?
Gilbert Melendez: I think I've been preparing for this guy for the last year and a half. I've just been thinking about him. A couple of times I've been thinking about him matching up wise. But I'm just going to bring in some more southpaw guys. Some good wrestlers that lean with their right leg forward and I'm also going to yeah I am going to reach out, one guy I am thinking about reaching out to, I haven't yet, but I think the word that got around is Jeff Glover. He's a really good grappler. He attacks really good from the bottom. I'm also training with this kid named Kyu who's a black belt world champ that trains with the Cesar Gracie camp here. I got Nick Diaz and I got some specific ideas of how I'm going to train like some situations I'm going to put myself in you know back escapes and rubber guard escapes, all kinds of jiu-jitsu, single-leg defense all kinds of stuff that I think Aoki can do. Aoki is actually I study fights and I watch about 5 times the guy I'm going to fight and I can usually break him down. I watch Aoki fights every day and I'm learning something new every day. He's a very smart, tricky fighter so it's actually fun training for him.
Jeffrey Harris: The other thing to worry about is his submissions can get quite vicious. Aoki drew a lot of controversy for his last fight against Mizuto Hirota. Do you have any thoughts on that incident? Do you think Aoki took it too far?
Gilbert Melendez: I mean, I believe you got to tap out or you're going to get hurt. That guy's arm got broke for not tapping out. Now him flipping the dude off in the face seemed uncharacteristic. It didn't seem like something Aoki would do. And I wouldn't be quick to judge if I've seen him do that every fight, I would maybe judge him a little more but who knows what really happened. Maybe that guy was talking crap on his mom or talking crap. I don't know what happened, you know. But for some reason Aoki decided he needed to do that or just had to go crazy like that. And maybe if he started doing it more and more and more, then I can understand. But as of now, I mean that's just not my place to comment
Jeffrey Harris: Well it wasn't just that but after the fight he made some comments of going out there to kill a guy if the president of DREAM tells him to and going over to the US to kill a guy in Strikeforce if he was told. It's kind of like the situation similar to the recent Frank Mir comments, the "to the death" type of comments. When you go out and hype a fight, can you go too far in trying to hype a fight? Do you draw the line somewhere, you know?
Gilbert Melendez: I guess you can draw the line somewhere, but honestly, I'll be honest with you. I've got a motto in there, I'm not trying to be a jerk, but my motto is kill or be killed. And regardless of people want to call it a friendly sport or hand-to-hand combat, it's not man. You're fighting in there and it seems like you're fighting for your life. I feel like I'm fighting for your life in there, so I can see how they have that mentality. And at times, I have that mentality where I actually, "Well, it's kill or be killed situation here. I'm out to hit him with bad intentions and I am." So, some people can come off strong with it and seem kind of vicious with it but you got to kind of try and understand them a little bit. Like, "hey it is war out there. It really isn't a sport. I mean it really isn't like a fun game of basketball." There's some serious stuff going on in there. But I guess some people yeah, it can go a little far, it can be offensive, but I don't take any offense to it. I feel like he's going to try and come to kill me, I'm going to try and do the same to him.
"I can't guarantee victory from here on out, but I guarantee I'll be ready to fight."
Jeffrey Harris: After you beat Aoki do you plan on flipping him off?
Gilbert Melendez: *Laughs* Nah, you know what man, I don't. It's just not my style. I like to do my talking on the field you know, I like to do my talking in there and just try to whoop his butt in the cage and after it's done, I'll just be happy and I'll even have a beer with the guy.
Jeffrey Harris: I thought that was a good, diplomatic answer. Now I've seen fans talk about your fight with Kawajiri and they say "Oh, Kawajiri got robbed!" And then I actually watched the fight. And from what I saw, Kawajiri did well early in the fight, but the rest of the fight I think you were dominating the standup and I think you knocked him down a couple times. And for that alone, I think you were the decisive victor, would you not agree?
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah, I agree man; I think I won that fight. It was hard because there were a lot of hardcore Kawajiri fans, and he was a lot of guys top fighter so it's hard but I tell ya, during the fight, after it was over, it was such a blur, it was so crazy and so chaotic, you don't know who wins. I don't know how many times I hit him; I know he just hit me a lot. But going back and watching it, I felt like I did squeeze it out. And the judges out there in Pride, they thought I did the same thing as well. So for me to get the victory in Japan I think it was pretty clear, it was obviously a close-battled war, but at the end I was moving forward and I was coming on him and I think I did come back strong. And thanks for that.
Jeffrey Harris: What was it like for you, Gilbert, to be fighting in Pride? You're a young guy going over to Japan and Pride, which was huge in the MMA world. What was that like fighting in Japan and fighting tough guys like Kawajiri early in your career?
Gilbert Melendez: Man, it was like a dream come true. I felt like, "Wow, I made it to the Super Bowl." There was a moment when 155 wasn't in the UFC and my goal was Pride during those years. I was like, "Well I'm not going to the UFC." My goal was Pride. And I finally made it to Pride. I thought I was going to start my career and finish it there and then it went away, but being able to fight on the same stage and being on the same card with Fedor Emelianenko twice and being on the same card with Dan Henderson and Gomi and Josh Barnett, I just wanted to be the first one of the night to fight so I can go back and sit in the front row. So I was going to go back and sit in the front row and enjoy the fights. It was amazing. It was fun and I wish it came back.
Jeffrey Harris: Your only two career losses are to Mitsuhiro Ishida and to Thomson. Those losses happened fairly close together in your career. What do you think happened after those fights that changed? Because I think after those fights you definitely seem to just be on a role. Call it the eye of the tiger or whatever you want, something really just seemed to start clicking especially with the second fight with Ishida.
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah man, I thought a little I was young, I whooped butt, I was also ranked #2 in the world and things were going swell. I was waiting for my next fight. I was going to do this lightweight grand prix, and then the next thing you know, UFC buys out Pride, I still had some things going on with Strikeforce, and I kind of it's the kind of things that just things don't line up and there's no fights available or have a little bit of a dry spell. And during that time I lost a little bit of motivation, maybe I should've stayed on top of my game and those other fights game around and I just wasn't my head wasn't on straight and my training wasn't structured. I trained hard, but I wasn't as structured. And after that second loss which was against Josh Thomson, I took a step back and said, "You know are you going to just do this for fun or make a career out of this?" And I said I wanted to make a career out of this, so I can't guarantee victory from here on out, but I guarantee I'll be ready to fight.
Jeffrey Harris: All great fighters and the best fighters lose. And I think you've definitely proven something by how you've fought after those losses and now becoming the champion and working to this fight with Aoki. It really feels like this is what your career has built to. I think this will be definitely one of the pinnacle fights of your career.
The Cesar Gracie camp fighters have really taken off and you guys have basically taken over the belt divisions of Strikeforce with you being the lightweight champ. Nick Diaz is the welterweight champion. And Jake Shields is the middleweight champion. It must be pretty cool coming back with all those belts, huh?
Gilbert Melendez: Heck yeah, dude. I mean c'mon man; shouldn't we get a magazine cover or something? The camp's been doing really well. Even Nathan Diaz has been doing really well. He's had some tough fights, but for being a young kid he's been doing great. I think he's going to be stepping up as well. But it's awesome now; all 3 of us have belts, 155-185. That's something we talked about and joked about how cool it would be and it happened. And it says something about our work ethic and how we've been together as a team and that we are a good team. And I hope we get a little more respect, you know we're not guys that are really out there that much, you know Nick likes to keep to himself so it's hard to get a lot of attention but yeah it's great man being part of such a great team and it'd be cool to get a little even more respect out there, you know.
Jeffrey Harris: Besides Aoki is there anyone else you'd really like to fight be it a rematch with Kawajiri or someone like that?
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah, I'd fight Kawajiri if he came to the states. I felt like I fought him in Japan and I'd fight him over here in the States. I saw something, I don't know if it's true or not, but that there'd be a rematch in Japan if me and Aoki would fight so, right now man, it's hard. Usually I could mention some names, but just thinking of Aoki right now, that's all I can really think of. Honestly before, I could give a list, but just now how could you think of anybody else? This is the guy to fight.
Jeffrey Harris: I mean I hope somewhere down the light you could fight KJ Noons because I think that would be a nifty fight.
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah that would be cool, you know what I mean. If they line me up with that, I'd be cool with that. I met the kid the other day and he's tough and everything, but I believe I have what it takes to beat him, yeah. I wouldn't mind taking that fight.
Jeffrey Harris: You're going to be in the EA Sports MMA videogame, right?
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah, I'm going to be in the EA Sports [game]. I got a chance to have a little sneak peak of myself in the game and get to play myself at the EA Sports party at Miami. It's pretty cool.
Jeffrey Harris: Are there any people or sponsors you would like to thank or give a shout out to?
Gilbert Melendez: Yeah, definitely. Adapt X-Labs. I'd like to thank The Throne, Metal Mulisha, Rockstar, Vertech, Kelly's Body Shop, EA Sports, Full Tilt, and you know just my team, my girl, my family and just everyone that helps. And thank you for the interview.
Jeffrey Harris: Gilbert, thanks so much for your time and answering all my questions, and good luck with this fight with Aoki. I think no matter what it will be a hell of a fight and this is one of the biggest title fights of the year.
Gilbert Melendez: Thanks man. I really appreciate it and I really just appreciate you supporting me and supporting the sport. Thank you very much.
Gilbert Melendez vs. Shinya Aoki will go down at Strikeforce: Nashville on April 17 and will be part of the live broadcast portion of the CBS Saturday Night Fights event. Remember to tune into 411mania.com for the best and quickest live play by play coverage of the event. So remember to bookmark us or add us to your homepage. You can also find out the latest happenings on 411mania.com by following us on Twitter:
