This Is Gonna Hurt by Tito Ortiz

Author:Tito Ortiz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gallery Books
Published: 2008-08-18T04:00:00+00:00

KRISTIN ORTIZ

There were so many incidents like that night at the House of Blues. Fans tended to look at Tito like he was God and not a real person. And nobody knew who I was. I was always getting knocked over and pushed out of the way. That’s just the way people are when they see somebody like Tito. It was exhausting being around him in public because he always had to be on.

Kristin was helping me out quite a bit; she was handling a lot of my business and helping to pay taxes. And I needed the help because I wasn’t making a lot of money, despite the fact that I was a champion. Even though Ultimate Fighting was evolving and reaching more and more people, the public perception was that it was a barbaric sport, stuck in the Dark Ages. Ultimate Fighters were considered crazy guys who did crazy shit.

Luckily my manager, Dana White, knew how to negotiate. He knew how to push without pushing too hard, and he wouldn’t budge on the important deal points. When it all came down, I had a great new contract, which was surprising, considering there wasn’t any pay-per-view back then and UFC merchandising was almost nonexistent. Before Dana, I was making maybe $50,000 tops for a fight. With my new contract, I was making $80,000 to $100,000 per fight.

Less than a year after Dana took over as my manager, there was a big change in the UFC.

The Fertitta brothers had been following the organization’s progress for a while and they recognized its potential—potential that was not being realized with Bob Meyerwitz at the helm. Bob was tired of the grind and was ready to sell, so the Fertittas bought the UFC from him for $4 million and then put about $25 million into the organization.

The impact on the fighters and the UFC was immediate. I was bound by my existing contract, but now I was flying in Learjets and staying in presidential suites…and loving every minute of it.

And, as always, I slipped right back into my crazy ways after winning the championship—running around, disappearing for days on end, and partying real hard, which was putting a real strain on Kristin and on our relationship.

We had been together for quite a while, and Kristin really didn’t want to do the single thing anymore. So she gave me a choice: either marry her or leave her. I didn’t want to lose Kristin because she was a really good girl and I cared about her deeply. But we were arguing a lot more and it was taking a toll on me. All the same, I still went out and bought a ring, and I was getting ready to take that step.

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