- Joined
- Mar 13, 2011
- Messages
- 41,748
- Reaction score
- 22,769
BY BEN DUFFY
JUL 11, 2019
Leslie Smith wants to fight so badly, she’s practically climbing the walls. In light of her other claims to fame -- activist, organizer, advocate for athletes’ rights, founder of Project Spearhead, UFC persona non grata -- it’s possible to lose sight of the fact that at her core, Smith is a fighter.
Possible until you speak to her, that is. Listening to the 36-year-old “Peacemaker” ahead of her featherweight clash with Sinead Kavanagh at Bellator 224 on Friday, there is an enthusiasm, an energy that hums underneath her responses like current through a live wire. You can hear it in the way she accentuates certain words when she says things like, “I’m a fighter. This is what I do, this is my life.”
It’s hard to blame Smith for feeling amped. When she steps into the cage at the WinStar Hotel and Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma, it will have been almost exactly two years since her last fight, the longest hiatus of her career. That long layoff, of course, was brought on by Smith’s infamous release from the UFC last April, in the wake of her refusal to take a last-minute catchweight fight against Aspen Ladd, who came in heavy for their scheduled bantamweight match. The UFC paid Smith her contracted purse, including win bonus, then summarily released her. Smith is candid in admitting that she had not expected that level of retribution from the promotion.
“I knew the UFC was going to do whatever they [could] to make sure I didn’t get any kind of win out of the situation,” Smith told Sherdog.com. “I didn’t necessarily think I was going to get released right then. I thought I might at least get to fight out the last fight on my contract. I knew for sure they wouldn’t sign me to another contract, but I guess I thought I would probably get to go in there one more time and finish my contract.”
Smith’s admission of surprise shouldn’t be mistaken for regret for having stood up for herself. Quite the opposite, in fact: she wouldn’t change a thing.
Read more at https://www.sherdog.com/news/articles/Leslie-Smith-Without-Regrets-158261#D0IZpRWioFHZUcY2.99
