Anthony Smith has found a lot of success as a middleweight in the UFC, but now things are changing because the fighter is moving up a weight class.
The fighter has now decided to compete at light heavyweight, especially after the effects that the last two weight cuts had on him.
“My vision was starting to blur and my eyes weren’t able to focus and I’m having the burning feeling in my back, like you can feel your organs hurting. I’m just cutting way too hard,” Smith said to MMA Fighting. “The last two weight cuts, along with the vision thing, towards the end I’m not able to stand unassisted for very long because I’ll pass out or I’ll fall over, I’ll lose my balance, I just can’t stand at all. The last two my hearing has started to go, it’s the weirdest thing. I’ll be cutting and I’ll just be sitting there and out of nowhere my ears will pop, it will pop one at a time so one will pop and my voice is just so loud in my head and I can’t hear myself talk because I’m echoing in my own head so I can’t speak in more than one sentence at a time because the echo is a little bit delayed. So if I say one sentence, it will be delayed, and if I start to say the second sentence immediately afterwards, I will hear the end of the first sentence as I’m trying to speak the second and I’ll get confused so I just stop saying anything. People think that I’m just grumpy and quiet, I’m not quiet, I get confused and I can’t have a conversation because I have two voices in my head.”
Smith fought as a middleweight for both of his runs in the UFC, earning a record of 4-3-0 in the promotion (28-13-0 overall).
It was after a loss to Thaigo Santos at UFC Fight Night Belem that Smith decided a change in weight class was necessary.
“When I left Brazil, I already knew in my head, I’m never f**king doing this again. I’m never coming down to ‘85 again. I can’t do it. I just can’t do it,” Smith said. “I knew that when I was leaving Brazil, but when I went to the PI a couple of weeks later, they were able to give me the hard information. Give me literature that I can read and I can show you that says, ‘Anthony Smith as far as strength, power, athleticism, and speed, is in the top 3-percent of all light heavyweights in the UFC that the PI has tested.’ Already. That’s as a middleweight.”
There is no word at this time as to when Smith is going to be making his divisional debut.
