Last weekend, in the main event of Bellator 170, MMA superstar Chael Sonnen\u00a0returned to the cage after a hiatus of three years. He did so against retiring UFC Hall-of-Famer Tito Ortiz.<\/p>\n
Though Chael Sonnen unleashed plenty of trash talk in advance of this fight<\/a>, assuring fans it was one that he’d always wanted and one he was determined to win<\/a>, he ultimately came up short, as he was forced to tap to a first round rear-naked choke<\/a>. In fact, Sonnen’s loss to Ortiz was so lopsided that many fans questioned the legitimacy of the fight, suggesting that it may have been a fix.<\/p>\n According to Sonnen, however this is not the case. The vanquished star gave his take on the whole ordeal on a recent episode of\u00a0The Luke Thomas Show<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a choke. It was an oxygen issue, not a pain issue,\u201d Sonnen said. \u201cDidn\u2019t you see it? I got put in a rear-naked choke. And then I got home and people were saying that it didn\u2019t look like it was on. I don\u2019t even know how to respond to that.”<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cAll I can tell you is I couldn\u2019t breathe. I didn\u2019t respect it when it went on. I thought we were going to get into scramble and I was going to come on top, but I was stuck. It\u2019s really hard to give up your back, ever. You give up your back in the first round before you have that sweat going, man, it\u2019s just a tough spot. And it\u2019s embarrassing, it\u2019s all those different things. But to answer your question head-on, yeah, it was a choke, it was not a crank.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n From there, Sonnen went on to address the surprisingly widespread allegations that he threw his fight with Ortiz.<\/p>\n \u201cI can tell you, if you\u2019re ever in a contest and somebody thinks that you threw it, like some of my fans in this case, like \u2018he wasn\u2019t trying\u2019 \u2014 no, the hard reality is I got put in a choke,\u201d he said. \u201cI was trying and he squeezed the choke better than I defended it, and as much as I appreciate you guys trying to give me an excuse, man, I\u2019m a guy who hates them.”<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s fun to be a good winner, it\u2019s hard to be a good loser, but it\u2019s the process. It\u2019s protocol and procedure, and if you get beat, you\u2019ve got to tap and surrender, man. You\u2019ve got to own it forever. You can\u2019t go back and say, \u2018well, I didn\u2019t try.\u2019 So as much as I appreciate supporters offering an excuse for me, there\u2019s not an excuse, man. I got put in a choke and I had to tap.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n What did you think of Chael Sonnen’s lopsided loss to Tito Ortiz? Sound off, PENN Nation!<\/p>\n This article first appeared on\u00a0<\/i>BJPenn.com<\/i><\/span><\/a>\u00a0on 1\/27\/2017.<\/i><\/p>\n\n
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