Mike Brown Looks Ahead to WEC 41, Looks Back on UFC 47

Mike Brown is the best featherweight in mixed martial arts, and he's getting ready for the biggest fight of his life. But as Brown prepares to defend the World Extreme Cagefighting title against Urijah Faber on June 7 at WEC 41, he says he's still pushing himself like he did when he was a young up-and-comer.

And Brown knows what it's like to be a young up-and-comer. Before the WEC gave small fighters a chance to fight on a big stage, he was struggling to make ends meet, including making $2,000 to fight on the undercard of UFC 47 in 2004.

In an interview with FanHouse, Brown talked about getting ready for his rematch with Faber and looking back at how far he has come in his MMA career. The full interview is below.

Michael David Smith: You've got a couple weeks to go before the biggest fight of your life. How are you feeling?
Mike Brown: Tired. And that usually means I'm ready. When you're getting sick of the training, and just can't wait for the fight already, that's when you know you've done enough.

How would you say your training for this fight compares with your training for the previous fight with Urijah?
It's been smoother, and I've been training better in this camp than I did in that camp, that's for sure. That one was really weird, really long. I trained for eight weeks and then I was all ready to fight, and then the fight got postponed another eight weeks because of (Hurricane Ike). This one I've had the right schedule. Really, though, the last 15 months or so I'd say my training has just gotten better and better, I've been training really well.

Have you changed your approach to Urijah since last time? And do you think he might change his approach to you?
No, not really. I think he might try to take me down this time, but I don't see a lot changing. He's a really well-rounded, dynamic fighter, so there's not any one thing you can prepare for. You just have to train hard and get a lot of different looks from your sparring partners: Guys who can wrestle, guys who can submit you on the ground, guys who can kickbox.

You beat Urijah so quickly last time, in just over two minutes. Were you able to learn anything from that fight or did you hurt him so early on that you didn't learn what kind of fighter he is?
I didn't learn a ton from him because we didn't have much of a fight. We circled for a minute and then we had a minute and a half of fighting and then it was over.

In your last two fights you've needed a total of less than five minutes to beat Urijah and Leonard Garcia. Is there any drawback to winning so quickly? Some fighters say they learn a lot and improve a lot from being tested in long, hard fights.
No, I think the guys who say that are usually early in their career and needing experience. I've got plenty of experience so that's not an issue for me. Maybe if you only have two or three fights and you've never gone the distance it's good to have one go the distance but once you've done it a few times, it's better to get out of there with a quick win.

You mentioned that you've been fighting for quite a while, and I want to get to your brief UFC experience, but are you at all surprised that now at age 33, with 25 pro fights under your belt, you're finally at the top of your game and finally getting recognition as one of the top fighters in the world?
Yeah, I'm surprised. Especially considering that I was fighting for a long time when people didn't even care about guys who weighed 145 pounds, like we didn't even exist. There was no prestigious title for 145-pounders. It didn't mean anything. So to reach a point at my career when 145 pounds is an established weight class that people care about, and I'm at the top of it, it's a nice feeling.

What does it mean to you to be fighting in the biggest 145-pound fight in MMA history?
It's a fun ride. It's a good time. It makes it all worth it. Through all that training, sometimes I wondered, 'Why am I doing this?' There were times when I was really struggling financially, and there was no money in the sport. Now it's a job I can make a living at, and that's great. Before I was putting everything on the line just because I loved the sport. Now it's not just for the love, it's for my job.

How has your life changed since you beat Urijah?
I just get recognized more and more interviews.

Have there been any down sides to that recognition?
No, no, no. I enjoy it. It's fun. It's not like I can't go to the supermarket or something, it's just cool that now I'll got to an MMA show and people know who I am, and sometimes people will see me and say hello. It's not like I'm Tom Hanks or something, though. It's a cool feeling. Like I've made it and done something pretty neat.

Now that you've reached this point in your career, have you given any thought to where would you put yourself among the top pound-for-pound fighters?
Rankings are just a matter of opinion, but I do know that at 145 I'm the No. 1 guy because I have the most prestigious belt. Anyone can lose, but I have the belt, and that makes me the No. 1 guy as long as I hold onto it.

You have one UFC fight on your record, a loss to Genki Sudo at UFC 47 in 2004. When you lost that fight, was that a big step back for you, and were you concerned that you werern't going to make it as a pro fighter?
No. At that point in my career, I just wasn't ready for that level of opponent. I was living up in Maine at the time, and walking around at 155 pounds, so I was too small for the lightweight class, and my jiu jitsu skills were just nowhere near a world-class fighter like Genki Sudo was at the time. A world-class guy like him was going to submit me, and that's what happened. At that point in my career, my goal was to get to the UFC, and I made it and I was content with that. I hoped I could pull it out and win that fight, but I wasn't the better fighter. But at that point I needed to make a decision, and I decided to keep pursuing this sport and get better by training with some of the best jiu jitsu guys in the sport. That's why I started training with American Top Team -- I wasn't getting submitted in training but then I'd get tapped in the fights, so I knew that meant I wasn't training with top guys. So I went to American Top Team, and they've got the best jiu jitsu guys in the world, and now I consider my submissions to be my strength.

Is there one submission you think is your best?
I've got some really good ones I've done in the gym, but I don't want anyone to know about them. I'm going to wait until just the right time to use them in a fight.

You made $2,000 for that UFC 47 fight, right?
Yeah, I made $2,000.

What were you doing for a living at the time?
I was doing odd jobs. I was doing everything. I think at that particular moment, during that time, I worked for National Distributors. I used to go into the stores and stock them up on Anheuser-Busch, Budweiser products. I had three or four stores on my route and if I worked fast I could get done in three to six hours. I didn't have to work a ton of hours so that allowed me to train around it. I worked as few hours as I could so I'd have as much time as possible for training.

Looking back on that UFC 47 card, it was a really good one. The main event was Chuck Liddell vs. Tito Ortiz, Nick Diaz and Robbie Lawler had a really good fight that night, Andrei Arlovski knocked out Cabbage Correira. What do you remember about that card?
I'm a big fight fan, so I was a little starstruck. I loved it. I had a great time. And actually, Genki was my all-time favorite fighter, and he still is. I felt great for that fight. I knew then that he was really good and that I was the underdog. I knew he was a little better than me, although I thought I could win, I just didn't make it happen.

Genki's previous fight right before he fought you was against Butterbean. That's quite a difference, going from an opponent who weighed 350 to an opponent who weighed 150.
Yeah, I couldn't learn a lot from watching the Butterbean fight.

Are you amazed at how much has changed for you since UFC 47?
I'm living a dream. I just can't believe I'm making a good living now, doing what I love, and I'm the No.1 guy in the world. I never thought I was going to be the No. 1 guy in the world. When I started, I just wanted to be able to say I did it. I just thought, "I want to try this once, because I'm a fan." And then once I had fought once I thought, "Well, if I get to five fights, then I can say I'm a veteran of the sport." And then once I had five fights I thought, "I want to make it to the UFC so I can say I fought in the biggest show in the world." And then when I did that I thought, "I've always wanted to fight in Japan." So I went over and did that. And then I started thinking I might be able to get myself into position to where I'm in the Top 3 in the world. And then once I did that I got my title shot, and there you go, I'm the No. 1 guy.