Quinton Jackson has been synonymous with unyielding toughness throughout his career. His relationship with Michael Bisping went through a roller coaster over the years and now he has shared some touching moments from their friendship.
Quinton “Rampage” Jackson is known for being stoic, rarely showing emotion even in the most extreme circumstances. But the former UFC light heavyweight champion recently admitted to an unexpected moment of vulnerability — shedding tears in response to an event that left even the battle-hardened Rampage surprised at his own reaction.
Quinton Jackson reveals about his locker room weeping
UFC 100 stands as one of the most iconic events in MMA history, featuring a stacked card topped by Brock Lesnar and Frank Mir’s heavyweight title rematch. But for Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson, the landmark 2009 PPV is also memorable for bringing out unexpected emotions.
He shared an incident from UFC 100, when even though he was not competing in the event, but his partner Michael Bisping was in the octagon against Dan Henderson. He revealed that he got emotional after Dan threw a brutal knockout punch on Michael Bisping.
He said that it was so harsh, that he went to the locker room and cried. He stated, “I never cried, but me and Bisping, we was like brothers, especially back then, we’re not as close as now because some bullsh*t happened between our managers. Me, (Cheick) Kongo, and Bisping we were all like brothers.”
“I never cried when I got knocked out, but when Bisping got knocked out the one time – it was him (points at Henderson). I cried in the locker room. He got knocked out that bad. I felt really bad. I’m almost ashamed to say it. I never cry. Some of my family members die, and I don’t cry.”
He felt weird crying and thought it was his fault as he was not a good sparring partner for Bisping and that’s why he got knocked out cold.
“I felt like, at the time, maybe I didn’t help him good enough in training or something,” Jackson said. “It was something like that, and I just felt bad for him. I remember crying in the locker room like, ‘What the f*ck is wrong with me? Why am I crying?’ I never cry. It’s weird.”
Rampage Jackson’s feud with Bisping later on
Teammates and best-friends at once becoming each other’s bitter rivals — such is the story of Quinton Jackson and Michael Bisping. Something unfavored was done by Bisping, which made Jackson break the association and the deep friendship they had. Quinton Jackson called Bisping a traitor and said Bisping did things which no friend would do, even after tons of favors from Jackson’s side.
“F-ck Michael Bisping,” Quinton Jackson said. “He’s a traitor. I was going through another court case that you guys don’t know about. I was always cool with Bisping, helped him train. I even paid half on some of his training camps, but he wanted me to pay for his sparring partners.”
“He would hurt my sparring partners and all this bullsh-t. I would never care. I was always cool with him. Then he gave a statement against me in the other lawsuit. That’s bullsh-t. How you going to do that to somebody who helped you out?”
“That’s why I said I would like to fight Bisping. He’s a f-cking a–hole. I’ve never done anything wrong to him. You don’t do that to your teammates. He’s a cheap motherf-cker because he doesn’t like to pay his manager when he owes him money. That doesn’t have anything to do with me. In order to help his case, he lies on me and gives some bullsh-t statements. I’d fight him on the playground if I knew I wouldn’t go to jail.”
From shedding tears for the buddy to calling him to a grudge fight and calling him a traitor, the friendship between Quinton Jackson and Michael Bisping saw polar opposites. Quinton Jackson’s friendship and brotherhood with Michael Bisping seems to be over but the moments they shared as training partners will be hard to erase for both Quinton and Bisping.
