{"id":334262,"date":"2019-12-05T11:03:57","date_gmt":"2019-12-05T19:03:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=334262"},"modified":"2019-12-05T11:03:57","modified_gmt":"2019-12-05T19:03:57","slug":"alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard\/","title":{"rendered":"Alistair Overeem has &#8216;no words&#8217; after death of Aniah Blanchard"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alistair Overeem was originally expected to fight Walt Harris in the main event of the UFC&#8217;s Saturday night stop in Washington D.C., but Harris withdrew from the matchup amid an unbelievable tragedy.<\/p>\n<p>His daughter went missing in October, and was found dead \u2014 the victim of murder \u2014 in November.<\/p>\n<p>When Harris withdrew from this fight, Overeem was given a replacement opponent in Jairzinho Rozenstruik. While Overeem is of course focused on the dangerous task ahead, he also feels great sadness for his would-be opponent Harris.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s awful what happened to Walt,\u201d Overeem told the assembled media in Washington D.C. (via <a href=\"https:\/\/mmajunkie.usatoday.com\/2019\/12\/alistair-overeem-saddened-aniah-blancard-tragedy-murder-kidnapping-would-hug-walt-harris-ufc-dc-washington\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">MMA Junkie<\/a>). \u201cI was following it every day \u2014 the little bits and pieces coming out. Usually, I\u2019d go on Twitter to follow it. It\u2019s really bad. It\u2019s a really bad situation. I have three daughters, myself. So yeah \u2013 no words.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Despite being scheduled to trade punches with Harris previously, all Overeem would want to offer his rival at this stage is a hug.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would give him a hug,&#8221; he said when asked what he&#8217;d say to Harris. &#8220;What can you say to anyone? I can\u2019t really say anything to that. It\u2019s awful, the situation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Though not directly involved in this tragedy, it would not be surprising if Overeem&#8217;s focus was joggled as he followed the heartbreaking twists of the story. Yet he says he&#8217;s been able to separate himself from the situation and focus on Rozenstruik.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt changed my focus in the sense that my opponent changed,\u201d Overeem said of how this tragedy has affected his fight preparation. \u201cOf course you follow the news. But let\u2019s not forget: It\u2019s not my child; it\u2019s not my relative. It\u2019s a little bit further away from me. But still, you\u2019re like, \u2018Hey this (expletive) really happens.\u2019 I went into the statistics and this stuff happens kind of often, too. It\u2019s sad. It\u2019s a really bad thing. I don\u2019t know how to fix that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Alistair Overeem and Jairzinho Rozenstruik fight Saturday night on ESPN+.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><i>This article first appeared on\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>BJPENN.com<\/i><\/span><\/a><i>\u00a0on 12\/5\/2019.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alistair Overeem was originally expected to fight Walt Harris in the main event of the UFC&#8217;s Saturday night stop in Washington D.C., but Harris withdrew from the matchup amid an unbelievable tragedy. His daughter went missing in October, and was found dead \u2014 the victim of murder \u2014 in November. When Harris withdrew from this [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54430,"featured_media":292076,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10192,39610,14403],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Alistair Overeem has &#039;no words&#039; after death of Aniah Blanchard | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"UFC heavyweight contender Alistair Overeem comments on the tragic death of Aniah Blanchard, the daughter of his would-be opponent Walt Harris.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Alistair Overeem has &#039;no words&#039; after death of Aniah Blanchard | BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"UFC heavyweight contender Alistair Overeem comments on the tragic death of Aniah Blanchard, the daughter of his would-be opponent Walt Harris.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"| BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/bjpenn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-12-05T19:03:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/Alistair-Overeem-4.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"696\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"399\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tom Taylor\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@bjpenndotcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@bjpenndotcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Tom Taylor\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/alistair-overeem-has-no-words-after-death-of-aniah-blanchard\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Tom Taylor\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#\/schema\/person\/e1a3f1e5a045aeaf5b59aa1549a06a87\"},\"headline\":\"Alistair Overeem has &#8216;no words&#8217; 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