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Murilo Ninja Rua’s declaration of retirement from active MMA competition
By Zach Arnold | May 21, 2011
Statement as released from a few hours ago:
Congrats to my opponent Tom Watson for the win tonight (at BAMMA 6), he was better and deserved it. I would like to announce officially my retirement from PRO MMA fights tonight. It was an amazing run, and its a very tough moment. But there comes a time for all in life, and it’s time to move on. I am proud of all I did in MMA and all experiences I had.
I will continue to work with MMA,doing seminars, teaching classes, training fighters,and doing my share to help our sport that I love so much. Its time now to help others and enjoy my family, my wife, my kids and move one. I want to thank so much all the fans for all the support. Always helping me out and giving me all incentive. Brazil, Japan, USA, England, Canada, Australia. All places I fought, thanks so much!! I want to also thank to all the trainers that helped me from day 1 as a white belt until now.All training partners that pushed me so much. All sponsors that believed and still believe in myself. All my friends in the press.
And mostly, I want to thank my true friends,my family, my mom and dad, my wife that I love so much, my kids who are my joy and my brothers. I want to thank my manager for being my friend, and I want to sincerely thank my brother for all support and making me so proud.
Life goes on, memories will stay forever, and MMA will still be my life forever. Thank you so much you all!
Murilo “Ninja” Rua.
Topics: Media, MMA, Zach Arnold | 8 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
It’s about time, he was great in his prime but has’nt done much in years and with him having brain damage this is the best for him and his family.
Lindland got tapped as well in Poland, there’s another guy who should think about giving it up, especially as he’s been brutally knocked out a few times in his career and he’s not exactly young either.
The Rua-Watson fight is horrific. Rua just takes a relentless beating with head kicks, punches, and knees for three rounds, leading to an inevitable knockout. I couldn’t really watch it, I had to skip through the video. If I were in Rua’s corner, I would have thrown in the towel midway through the second round. Watson looks genuine concerned at the end.
I am happy Rua has retired and I really hope he won’t suffer a lot of long-term damage from the injuries he’s sustained in this sport.
I agree 100% with cutch, it’s about time. The vast difference in speed, reflexes, chin between the Murilo Ninja Rua who fought Mario Sperry and the version we saw against Tom Watson is like night and day. Still, he had a good run, seemed like a nice enough guy who genuinely enjoyed MMA, much respect to him for knowing when to say when.
[…] statement (via Fight Opinion): Congrats to my opponent Tom Watson for the win tonight (at BAMMA 6), he was better and deserved […]
There are a good number of fighters who need to retire. Sadly it doesn’t happen fast enough for a lot of them. A quick list that comes to mind: Pedro Rizzo, Ken Shamrock, Matt Lindland, Dan Severn, Frank Trigg, Kazushi Sakuraba, & others.
They get to the point of being almost dilusional about where they are in the fighting landscape. It’s almost worst in boxing due to the type of shots they take to the head.
Even with guys like Bernard Hopkins or Randy Couture….. Even if they are finding success later in life, I cringe at the thought of them taking so many head shots for such a long period of their lives.
Ninja was an absolute mess last night straight after the fight, but seemed ok at the hotel later.They gave him multiple pain relief injections at the arena. He didn’t stick around for drinks though, understandably. I got the sense from talking to him during the week that he’d reached the point where it was a good idea to hang them up…he had that ‘thing’ about him, speech was slightly off on occasion etc. Glad to see him retire, and honoured to have sat cageside at his last fight.
Is there going to be an article or discussion about Bernard Hopkins’ fantastic performance last night?! Oldest man to win a legitimate world title in style too, is something I would consider newsworthy.
Ninja vs Sperry was so badass at the time. And the flying knee KO of Shoji.