There are elements to the fight game that will forever be unknowable to anyone that isn’t a fighter or part of a team, no matter how closely they watch the sport or how much content they consume. Some pieces of this puzzle are destined to be foreign to those that remain on the outside of the cage looking in, and can only be understood in full if you’ve experienced them.
One such scenario is the decision-making process behind withdrawing from a fight, which is something Javid Basharat unfortunately had to do last year.
Scheduled to face off with veteran Chris Gutierrez in early August, the Dana White’s Contender Series (DWCS) graduate had to bow out of the contest a week before the event, resulting in an extended stay on the sidelines that will finally end this weekend in Seattle when he steps in with Pacific Northwest native Ricky Simon.