Facing Evan Tanner: Rise of a champion

In one of the final episodes of the iconic Japanese anime "Dragon Ball Z," the villain turned anti-hero Vegeta looked upon his rival Goku and observed the difference in their two styles of combat.

While Vegeta always fought for pleasure, Goku only ever battled to test his limits, push himself beyond those limits and become the strongest he could possibly be.

One must wonder if DBZ creator Akira Toriyama ever met Evan Tanner. That's exactly the mindset Tanner carried anytime he faced someone.

“He was never about hurting anyone," Paul Jones said. "It was intense, but some guys you train with and they just want to go hard and prove how tough they are. Evan was never that way. He wanted to make you and himself better.”

After high school, Tanner moved to Iowa to attend Simpson College before dropping out at 19. He worked several odd jobs, went to OU for a semester and eventually found his way back to Amarillo. That's when he met Steve Nelson and began competing in the Unified Shoot Wrestling Federation.

And thus Evan Tanner's journey to becoming a world champion began.

Real

That was the word Tanner's former Muay Thai teacher Renzo Asparria used to describe him. Ironic, given that much of what Tanner was able to accomplish in his career seemed so mythical.

Aside from his high school wrestling, Tanner had no formal training in combat. He was almost entirely self-taught, learning Jiu-Jitsu from instructional video tapes. Tanner was considered a pioneer in MMA as he was one of the earliest fighters to use elbows as an effective striking method in the ground and pound position.

“I knew him to be a very hard working individual," Jones said. "Really, he taught himself and he was really brilliant...He had no formal training whatsoever and yet his leg kicks were some of the most vicious you’d see. He knew how to torque the angle and not hit things straight on.”

These days fighters typically schedule no more than three matches in a year in order to properly train, recover and prevent injury. In the early days of MMA, fighters had three fights in a single night. That's how many Tanner fought the night he won the USWF championship.

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Though Tanner never weighed more than 205 lbs., he fought in the heavyweight class, often going up against competitors 50-60 lbs. larger than him. Jones noted that most fighters are usually looking to drop down a weight class to have an advantage over smaller opponents. Tanner had no interest in easy victories.

“When he’d do USWF I saw him kick the dog tar out of a heavyweight that had to have been 300 pounds from Oklahoma City," Deana Epperson said. “His wrestling was just so top notch and he was so early in MMA that those standup strikers didn’t know how to deal with him.”

Eventually Tanner ended up buying the USWF from Nelson and served as both the main event fighter and promoter for the entire event. In Gerard Roxburgh's documentary, it was noted that Tanner would win a fight and proceed to go around the event center collecting money from sponsors, still bloodied.

There wasn't much money in the USWF, however. Additionally, there seemed to be something else.

Again, the details of Tanner's life were sometimes unclear. One thing several people said might explain why Tanner doesn't get included in many people's Texas Panhandle sports Mount Rushmore, though.

He hated it here.

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Jones said he didn't know if that was the case or if they just had better training other places. Epperson said she didn't know that he "hated" the Panhandle, or that he just felt he didn't belong.

Johnny Hannay, however, said hate was an accurate word.

"He hated Amarillo," Hannay said. "He looked me point blank in the face when he said that."

Paige Craig said the reason for that hatred was due to the people and culture. Hannay said it wasn't anything that disdainful.

"This was coming from a young man whose memories of the place were mostly not great," Hannay said. "People will hear that (he hated Amarillo) and think one thing, but it wasn’t malicious. Amarillo was nothing but pain for him. It’s not reflective of the people or anything at all...He was just a square peg in a round hole.”

In the mid 90's, Tanner left for Tokyo to join Pancrase, where he became the first American to win the Neo-Blood Tournament. He returned to America in 1999 to make his debut for an up and coming fight promotion company known as the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

Bushido

That was the word former opponent Elvis Sinosic used to describe Tanner. Sinosic believed Tanner embodied that Samurai code in his career.

“Evan was not the kind of guy that attended afterparties," Sinocic said. "He kind of kept to himself. He exemplified a lot of the martial spirit and culture that I also followed and believed. He was more about respect, facing that challenge, overcoming the obstacles and bettering yourself."

By this time, he was working with Team Quest, joined by future Olympic Silver Medalist Matt Lindland, UFC veterans Ryan Schultz and Chris Leben, and eventual UFC Hall of Famer Randy Couture.

Yes, that Randy Couture.

Tanner opened his UFC career 7-2 with his lone losses coming to legendary fighters Tito Ortiz and Rich Franklin. After downing Welterweight Champion Robbie Lawler and moving to 30-4 overall professionally, he prepared for the biggest fight of his career at UFC 51.

The bout was against David Terrell for the vacant title of UFC Middleweight Champion. The fight lasted 4:35 and ended in a TKO. In Epperson's words, "Tanner emasculated Dave Terrell."

With that, Tanner was awarded the UFC Middleweight championship belt and his name was etched into MMA history.

Something difficult to understand is that if Evan Tanner was the UFC Middleweight Champion of the world, why isn't he more recognized? To understand that, you have to be familiar with the history of the UFC.

Roxburgh, who now works for the UFC, and former Sports Illustrated journalist Josh Gross both explain that the 30-year history of the UFC can be broken down into pre "Ultimate Fighter" and post "Ultimate Fighter."

"The Gracie family pretty much created the tournament in order to prove that Gracie Jiu Jitsu was the best martial art around," Roxburgh said. "They ran the first few UFCs and then sold it to Dana White and Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta."

Cage fighting was still illegal in many parts of the country until the mid-2000's and UFC was in massive amounts of debt. When "The Ultimate Fighter" TV series debuted in January of 2005, it helped launch the sport into newfound heights.

"Before 'The Ultimate Fighter' the UFC had probably about 50 or 60 athletes and were doing Pay Per View events once every few months," Roxburgh said. "Now, the UFC has about 800 athletes and does events almost every single weekend.”

Tanner defeated Terrell in February of 2005 when the first season of TUF was airing. MMA was not yet the must-see event that it's since become. According to those who knew him, Tanner was perfectly fine not being recognized around the world.

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"He was a super deep thinker," Schultz said. "Right after he won the world title he’d say things like, ‘What does that really mean, though, right? I’m just a grain of sand on the beach.’ I was just like, ‘You’re still the world champ, bro. No one can ever take that from you.’”

Except someone did take it from him just a few months after the Terrell fight. In fact, Tanner only fought five more times after beating Terrell. For underneath his quiet and introspective disposition, there lied an internal battle that those around him came to see externally: Alcoholism.

EDITORS NOTE: This is part two in a five-part series. Part three will be released tomorrow.