UFC welterweight Marcus Davis lives for fighting and family as win streak grows

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This article was published 18/06/2007 (6999 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (CP) – Fighting and family. That’s what makes Marcus Davis tick.

At times they don’t combine that well. Davis has gone through two marriages, although he has reconciled with his second wife and is talking about tying the knot again. They have four kids: 16,-, six and an 11-month toddler.

“It’s awesome. I have basically two passions in life – and that’s the fighting and playing with my kids,” the American mixed martial arts welterweight said in an interview. “When I’m home, all I do is I’m playing with them and I’m recording them doing whatever they’re doing. We just do so much together.”

The night before he left for Northern Ireland, he took the whole crew bowling.

Davis, 33, was all business Saturday at UFC 72, however, needing just 75 seconds to dispatch Jason Tan. The jug-eared English fighter, whose background is in accounting, was almost prescient when he walked in to the strains of the Rolling Stones’ “Gimme Shelter.” Minutes later the referee was protecting him in the ring from Davis’ onslaught.

Davis’ last loss was in November 2005 to Melvin Guillard in the finale of Season 2 of “The Ultimate Fighter” reality TV show. But Davis says he’s not one to demand attention.

“I’m really happy where I’m at. I’m not one of those fighters that fights because they have to win these belts … I fight because if I don’t fight, I’ll go crazy. My family will tell you that the second I started walking I was throwing punches. Ever since then, if I’m not fighting, I’m watching it on TV, I’m on the computer doing it. I might even be playing a video game with fighting. It runs my life. It’s an obsession.

“It’s ruined two of my marriages,” he added with a chuckle. “So it’s what I’m about. It’s who I am.”

Davis says being a fighter is a lifestyle – and if you want to be good at it, you have to live that lifestyle.

That’s been hard for his partners, even if they came into the relationship knowing his commitment to his sport, he acknowledges.

“I have to be punching or getting punched at least every other day or something. If I’m not. I actually go through withdrawals.”

Now he returns home to friends, family and his proper handle. Normally known as The Irish Hand Grenade, the former pro boxer switched to The Celtic Warrior for UFC 72.

“The Irish Hand Grenade would be like being the Taliban Bomber and fighting in New York City,” he explained.

When he started as a boxer, everyone had a different name for him but The Irish Hand Grenade stuck. “I fell in love with the name and I’ve used it every since I was’ years old.”

The 170-pounder says competing in Ireland was literally a dream come true.

“I actually had a dream growing up as a kid that I wanted to box in Ireland when I was a professional boxer. And then when I retired from boxing, I just assumed that that was never going to happen. And then when I started doing MMA, I never thought abut it again because I didn’t expect MMA to be big enough to ever bring me into Ireland to fight.”

Both sides of his family have Irish bloodlines before coming to Maine, where Davis grew up on a fruit, produce (and potato) farm.

Maine remains his home. He runs a gym in Bangor called Team Irish that is home to six pro and 12 amateur fighters and a slew of MMA devotees. His wrestling coach there is Garth Krane, a New Brunswicker who was a former alternate on the Canadian Olympic team.

“I teach and I train and I fight and that’s it,” Davis said.

Davis has ties to former heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia, a Maine native who used to be a doorman at a nightclub Davis managed. There used to be plenty of rough stuff at the bar and Davis decided Sylvia, then 6-8 and 335 pounds, need to learn how to handle himself.

“I just told him ‘Listen man, you need to learn how to fight. You’re big,. Guys are going to point you out and come after you specifically because you’re big. And you’re really awkward. So we need to teach you how to fight.”‘

Sylvia started coming to Davis’ gym. He later ran into famed trainer Pat Miletich at a UFC event and moved there to train, going on to win the UFC heavyweight title.

Davis’ first love was boxing. He was 22-1 and a USBF regional champion, but his love for the sport changed.

“I started losing my passion because it wasn’t as fulfilling as when I started it, because it was so dirty. I had so many bad things happen to me by the politics of boxing. It ran its course in me. And when the mixed martial arts started and I said I would do that, everybody said I was crazy. But I knew that I could get into this sport and probably out of it before it could get as bad as it was for boxing.”

The UFC takes good care of him, he says. From production assistant to president, “everyone’s treated me with respect and I love it.”

These days, they have reason to as Davis just keeps winning. In December there was a unanimous decision over cagey Shonie Carter. And in April, he submitted veteran Pete Spratt at UFC 69.

Despite his win streak, Davis say he has trouble convincing some of his legitimacy.

“There’s the crowd that still thinks I’m primarily a standup fighter, not really that well-rounded. Then there’s the group that thinks that I have come full circle and that I’m able to do everything. And then there’s another group that just thinks everything I’ve done has been luck, that I’m not that good.”