Lindland On Fedor Fight, A. Silva, UFC Buying PRIDE

By Luis Cruz

Matt Lindland is arguably the top 185 pound fighter in mixed-martial arts today, and is known worldwide as a silver medalist in greco-roman wrestling in the Olympics.

Not only that - he's also part of the best fight team in MMA today - Team Quest. Already in 2007, Team Quest fighter Dan Henderson shocked the world knocking out Vanderlei Silva to become the first multiple weight-class champion in a major organization in MMA. Also in 2007, Team Quest fighter Randy Couture came out of retirement at age 43 to regain the Heavyweight title via dominant victory over two-time champion Tim Sylvia.

Later this month in the main-event of the second ever BodogFIGHT pay-per view, Matt Lindland will attempt the most shocking of the Team Quest accomplishments. Lindland will jump up two weight-classes to Heavyweight and challenge the PRIDE Heavyweight champion, and arugably the best pound for pound fighter on the planet today - Fedor Emelianenko.

Luis Cruz discussed that fight among many other topics in an interview with "The Law," conducted yesterday, March 31, 2007. Thanks to Roy Mackie for writing up the following full text transcript.

Luis Cruz of MMANews.com: This is Luis Cruz of MMANews.com, and I'm joined now by one of the top Middleweights in the world, Matt Lindland. What's up, Matt?
Matt Lindland: Not just one of the top, but the top. What's going on though?

MMANews.com: [Laughs] How's the training going? Have you been healthy?
Matt Lindland: Yeah, oh yeah. I'm very healthy, I'm doing good, and I'm training hard.

MMANews.com: I was actually wondering about your weight for this fight [with Fedor Emelianenko]. What's going to be a comfortable weight for you here?
Matt Lindland: Well, I weighed 206 [pounds] today.

MMANews.com: Is there any goal weight that you're trying to reach?
Matt Lindland: Not really setting a goal, I'm just figuring when I, when I start tapering my training, [in the] week after next, um, I'll probably bounce up another five pounds.

MMANews.com: Alright. Well, obviously everybody knows you've got the biggest fight of your career coming up now, and you're taking on Fedor Emelianenko, who's the current PRIDE Heavyweight Champion. How did this fight come about?
Matt Lindland: Well... they were looking for a suitable opponent for Fedor Emelianenko and, there's not a lot of, you know, Heavyweight free agents out there. Most of the top Heavyweights are signed with other organizations, and you know, I'm one of the top fighters in the world and I think they wanted a quality opponent; so that was the thought, you know, lets get someone who's maybe not in the same weight class but, you know, he's a quality opponent, and, uh, ranked number one in his own weight class. So we've got number one versus number one.

MMANews.com: Now, what was the purpose of you taking this fight? Like, when they asked you. What went through your mind of why this is a fight you want to take?
Matt Lindland: Well, the purpose of taking any fight is to get in there, beat someone's ass and get paid! You know, thats the... anytime you take a fight, thats the whole goal of being a prize fighter.

MMANews.com: Now, were you, uh, I don't know how to word this... were you honored or anything, that they'd choose you to take on Fedor?
Matt Lindland: Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think that says a lot about the kind of fighter than I am, that they would consider me, and ultimately offer me a contract to fight Fedor. Yeah, I think its a great opportunity, and it is certainly an honor to be picked, you know? I know Fedor passed over some other opponents because he didn't think they were, you know, tough enough opponents, or they didn't have good enough records. So, I was glad [that] he looked at me and thought "Hey, this is a guy I'm willing to fight."

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