Michael McDonald hitting reset button on career after disappointing UFC run

He has a natural talent for fighting, and so Michael McDonald fights. But don’t call him a fighter, because that’s not necessarily how he sees himself.

The former UFC title challenger was once one of the hottest prospects in the sport. But he’s a complex and contradictory person, and one is never sure where he’s going with a sentence.

He loves the martial arts and says he would be perfectly content if he never had to do another interview or fight in front of a crowd again. Yet, the fight game is how he supports his family and allows him to do what he believes is his true calling.

McDonald turned pro at 16 and by 20 was in the UFC. By 22, he was competing for the world title.

But his time in the UFC was ultimately a disappointment to those who believed he had the ability to do far better than a 6-3 record and losses in his biggest fights. He was plagued by injuries and contract disputes and a once-promising career fizzled.

He’ll have a chance for a career reset in the main event of Bellator 191 on Friday in Newcastle, England, when he meets Peter Ligier in his debut for the promotion after asking for, and being granted, his UFC release earlier in the year.

His passion for the sport seemed to have evaporated by the time he was 24. By 26, he was out of the UFC.

“If I didn’t think I could achieve greatness, I wouldn’t be doing this,” McDonald said of professional fighting.

He’s not the type of fighter to accept praise easily or to dutifully say he’s preparing for a championship shot. That’s because while fighting is a means for an end to him, it’s all about the platform to McDonald.

He views himself as a minister and the bully pulpit his fighting skills give him allow him to preach the word of God.

When asked if he would prefer to pursue his passion for martial arts in private and not on such a public stage, he quickly said, “90 percent yes and 10 percent no.”

“There is a cap on how much I can make woodworking,” McDonald said. “The potential income from fighting is much greater. Part of why I do this is because of my family and to support them. But I do believe this is part of the mission that Christ has given me. I’ve been able to travel all over the country and tell how Christ has changed my life.

“If I were just a woodworker and not a fighter, I wouldn’t have such an opportunity. But as a fighter, I can talk about what Christ has done for me and how he’s changed my life. He took me from someone who wanted to kill himself and was a completely broken addict with no hope in his life to someone who God has poured out his blessings on and shown his goodness to. And that is a thing that people only care about because I fight in a cage.”

And they don’t often want to listen to a guy preach about his religion, even if he is a cage fighter, if he’s losing a lot. McDonald lost three of his past five in the UFC and went 750 days between fights.

His body was beaten up, his confidence was wavering, his approach was not right and his finances were in tatters. He began the process of splitting from the UFC because he said he couldn’t earn enough money to put together a legitimate training camp.

After an impressive 2013 win over Brad Pickett, McDonald landed a Dec. 14, 2013, bout with ex-world champion Urijah Faber. Faber was, for a long time, the standard at bantamweight in mixed martial arts: Beat Faber, or just lose competitively with him, and it was clear you were ready for the big time. Faber had been so good for so long that he was a measuring stick of a fighter’s potential.

McDonald believed he could beat Faber, and though he didn’t say it in so many words, he gives off the impression he still believes that, even though he was submitted in two one-sided rounds when the fight occurred.

Part of it, McDonald said, was his approach and a curiosity to explore limits.

“I like to be able to test my theory on how to do something better in the martial arts on other experts, and that’s a part of it I enjoy,” McDonald said. “I love take this stuff and coming up with some ideas and putting them to the test in the most real environment possible and seeing what the results are.

“I’ve had theories that I thought would work and they didn’t. When I fought Faber, I came up with this whole anti-Faber theory. I said, ‘OK, this is what he does with everybody and I think I’m going to be able to do this and stop what he’s always done.’ But I was being anti-him instead of pro-me. That was a theory that failed miserably, and you see a lot of martial artists do that, go off of pure theory.”

Part of what makes McDonald so fascinating is that he is so candid. He destroyed ex-WEC champion Miguel Torres at UFC 145 in 2012, stopping Torres in the first. That win raised McDonald’s record to 15-1 overall and 4-0 in the UFC. It stamped him with the future star tag.

McDonald, though, shrugs off that win in a blunt manner that few fighters ever do.

“That fight was the perfect fight time for me,” McDonald said. “Miguel had lost a couple of fights and he wasn’t feeling very confident. He was super hesitant when I got in there. Because he was hesitant and gun shy, oh my goodness, it was just open fire. It ended with total domination because he was so intimidated and at a point of his career where he was trying to change everything in his life and his fighting style. He was super unconfident in himself.”

Fighters may think that and they may say it in private to their loved ones, but that type of comment is one rarely heard in public.

McDonald, though, is a different breed. And as he embarks on the second act of his career, he has one goal in mind.

World championship? Well, sure, but that’s not it.

“My goal, as always, is to be a follower of Jesus Christ, but to show through my actions the greatness of our Lord,” McDonald said. “I’m in this position that some may say is prominent and when people ask me questions, I want to be able to answer them honestly and let Christ’s love shine through and not just shout ‘Bible’ right away and scare everyone off.

“Of course what I’m doing is ministry, there’s no doubt. But I don’t have to say I’m a minister, or a preacher to go out and spread the good news and tell people about the power and the love of Christ.”

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