Brian Ortega did not shy away from admitting that he was bothered by his unexpected ankle injury the entire fight with Yair Rodriguez at UFC Mexico.
Brian was lucky the fight went to the ground
Speaking to ESPN MMA backstage, “T-City” opened up about rolling his ankle while being introduced by Bruce Buffer. According to Ortega, his ankle felt weak the entire first round and it was also the reason he got tagged by “El Pantera.”
“That’s why I got beat up that first round,” Ortega said of his ankle injury. “Bruce [Buffer] was introducing me and I was, you know when you go to fight, you want to be tense but relaxed so you don’t exert yourself too much so when I jumped up, I was tense but when I landed it was relaxed and my whole ankle rolled and I was like, ‘Oh no! I was like no way this just happened.”
“And then I was kind of like feeling it and I was trying to like tense it up but it just felt weak and I was worried about the ankle when I was walking I was like, ‘Dude how am I going to do five rounds with a rolled ankle right now?’ Good thing we went three,” he added.
Ortega further revealed that things played out the way he wanted in the second round and he managed to fight his way to a submission victory despite having a hurt ankle.
“Honestly, I was thinking about the ankle, I got caught. When you go into the first round, your jaw still hasn’t warmed up so it kind of caught me off guard,” Ortega reflected. “Again, I was thinking about the ankle, fell, and I was like well at least we’re on the ground, I said I don’t have to walk and we just you know kept the jiujitsu going, tried some submission, but he was very well of my of my stuff, he played in the guard with me pretty well so I was like the more he stayed in there, the better it was for me and then by the time the second round was there I was like all right I got my composure back, adrenaline kicked in, I don’t feel that ankle, let’s get to work.”
Title could be next for Brian
Ortega was able to avenge his TKO loss to Rodriguez in 2022 due to a shoulder injury. Prior to that, “T-City” lost to Alexander Volkanovski during their title fight at UFC 266.
However, the win over Rodriguez will move Ortega to the Top 3 in the featherweight division. With reigning champion Ilia Topuria looking for some fresh opponent as his first title challenger, it wouldn’t be a shock if “T-City” gets another crack at the title.
Watch Ortega’s full interview below:
