Randy Harrison
Another episode of The Ultimate Fighter's tenth season, The Heavyweights, is in the books and that means that it's time for another interview blog featuring Nokaut's own resident castmember and TUF 10 blogger, Zak Jensen. This week, we get to talk to Zak about Matt Mitirone's on-again, off-again shoulder injury, Rampage's assertion that he's being edited into a bad coach, the fight with Wes Sims and Justin Wren and a whole lot more. We'll also get to the bottom of the incident involving Zak in the shower that led to Wes Sims going after him with some biting remarks as well, so let's get into Zak's take on week five of The Ultimate Fighter 10 and what he thought of this week's episode!
Nokaut.com: So in the first segment of the show, we've already seen more of you than we did in the first four episodes. How was that for you to actually get to see yourself on TV like that instead of just a few seconds here and there?
Zak Jensen: It was nice to see on TV because I basically got a full episode with Wes fighting and he was the one giving me the [expletive]. It was good in that sense, but getting to watch what I had already lived through with that whole situation was a little weird because people were asking me if I really jerked off in the shower and I had to tell them that I didn't.
Nokaut.com: So it was fun, but kind of like opening an old wound at the same time then?
Zak Jensen: They really weren't even wounds because I knew it wasn't true. It was just more of a situation of having to live through the annoying Wes Sims again. (laughs)
Nokaut.com: You talked about freaking out when you're on your back. Do you feel like that's something that's gotten better at all during your career, or is it something that you find yourself still needing to work on even after six weeks of training twice a day every day?
Zak Jensen: Well, I'm getting better at it, but I still need to work on it. I'm a wrestler and that's my background and being on your back is strange for a wrestler. If you notice that I couldn't wall-walk during the show, I still can't, it's weird. I don't know what it is, I just can't get it down. When Rampage tells me just to get off my back however I want to do it, you basically see me switch my hips, turn it into a wrestling sprawl and get up. I can get off of my back, it's just the matter of how I'm going to do it. The wall-walk, I've never done that before so it was completely new. It made me look like I was kind of an idiot because it was the first time that I had ever tried to do that. Where I train in Minnesota, we don't have a cage. Obviously, we have a wall because it's a building, but I've never done that before so it's definitely a new experience. I can wrestle to get off my back, it just wasn't what he was wanting me to do in that situation. It was extremely frustrating and as you saw, I got up and said "I [expletive] suck" because I was frustrated as all hell.
Nokaut.com: Was that one of those cases where you were worried a bit about the editing monster making you out to be less of a wrestler than you really are?
Zak Jensen: Yeah, it showed that I couldn't wall-walk so that part was the truth and they got that aspect of it, but it wasn't like they asked me if I had ever done it before. It really wasn't edited badly and it made it look bad, but it just showed that I can't wall-walk and that's the truth.
Nokaut.com: What was your take on Rampage's assessment of you being big and having wrestling and that's about it? Do you feel like he was selling you short a little bit?
Zak Jensen: Well, to that point all he knew was that I was a wrestler. I mean I grew up doing tae kwon do and boxing so I have that background, it's just that I'm more comfortable with wrestling so that's what I always fall back on. All of my fights have basically been me taking the guy down and taking him out with ground and pound, or I have a few stand-up knockouts. I mean I know I can do it and I love doing it, but if I feel more comfortable on the ground, I'll take them down. You always go back to what you feel most comfortable doing and what I'm most comfortable doing is wrestling. I didn't take it as a dig, I took it as me being a big guy that can wrestle because that's the truth. I'm not the most skilled guy on the entire team. You've got guys like Scott Junk and Wes Sims, even though he got choked out, he's got more experience than I do and definitely fought higher-level guys than I have in my career. If you look at it, yeah, I'm not the most skilled because I don't have a jiu-jitsu belt at any level and the truth only hurts a fool. I'm not the most skilled guy and I'm a big wrestler, so I didn't take it in any way bad whatsoever.
Nokaut.com: We kind of have to deal with the elephant in the room here, so let's hear the whole story about what happened with the infamous shower and what they had to say about you and what they showed and what didn't get shown?
Zak Jensen: The only truth of that story was that I took a shower and then Wes Sims took a shower after me. That is the only truth of that entire story. (laughs) You heard Wes in his confessional in the first episode that he'll never let the truth get in the way of a good story and that's how he is. It was a good story. Obviously, it was good TV because they put it in the episode. My phone was going crazy when that happened. I got about twenty text messages in five minutes when that happened. All of my buddies from high school and college texting me and telling me that it's gross and I'm telling them that I would explain it later because I didn't even want to get into it then. If you know Wes, you know he's a big goofball, even a bigger goofball than Rampage is. If you saw the little blurb during the commercial, where he's in a gi with a white belt on. He puts it on more than once and there are some shenanigans when he's in it. If you know him, he's more talk than truth.
Nokaut.com: So we should expect to be seeing more of Wes and his gi in the future then?
Zak Jensen: Yeah, if it makes it to TV and it should make TV because it was funnier than hell. Of course, the preview for next week has him talking about how I sniffed his shorts. He didn't get me to get pissed off with the whole masturbating in the shower thing, so he jumped to the next level of smelling another man's pants. He just jumped from one thing to the next to see if he could get me pissed off or not. You heard me on the show talking about how you can try to get me as pissed off as you want to, that I'll do my talking when I fight. There's really no reason to do it any other place and my thing is that we're all grown men. If you want to give someone crap like that, it just shows that you're immature and that's kind of why I don't fire back. It kind of elevates them if I do that, so I just let it roll off my back.
Nokaut.com: We talked last week about how you were feeling like they would show the whole thing and not just bits and pieces around it. Do you feel like it was a pretty accurate portrayal of what happened in that situation?
Zak Jensen: It was actually worse than what they showed because he didn't stop for like four hours. He just kept going and going and going and then James chimed in. James is an ass so if you give him any fuel, he just goes. It was worse than what it showed.
Nokaut.com: So you said about four hours they were going after you. Was it something that was over that day or did it end up sticking around for a few days after before they went to the next new thing in their quest to break you?
Zak Jensen: It stuck around for the rest of the show actually. When you see Wes Shivers talking to Rampage about the whole incident, that was the next day so it carried on for all of it.
Nokaut.com: What are your thoughts about what they were saying about you, more specifically Brendan saying that you shouldn't be there?
Zak Jensen: When I saw Brendan say that I shouldn't be there, I was feeling like who is he to say something like that because the people at Spike and the people at the UFC thought I should be, so who are you to say that?
Nokaut.com: In his most recent blog, he almost backtracked a little by saying that you're one of the nicest guys he knows and that he was more referring to you being a sheep in a house with fifteen wolves and that the house maybe wasn't the best place for you because of your personality.
Zak Jensen: Yeah, I'm an introverted person, I'm not an [expletive]hole, so when you're in a house with guys like Wes Sims and James and a bunch of alpha males that pride themeselves on giving people [expletive], I'm glad I'm not one of them. Everybody that I know is surprised that I fight because they think that it doesn't really fit my personality at all. I'm just a calm, quiet guy that happens to love MMA and love what I'm doing.
Nokaut.com: Hearing him say that now, do you think that his original quote was kind of taken out of context, or do you think it's him trying to go back and pretty it up a little bit since it could be taken as kind of a harsh statement?
Zak Jensen: Brendan is a nice person, the complete opposite of James, even though they're teammates back home. He's a genuine nice person and one of the really good guys in the house. With that whole calendar thing, he picked a date, but it was more like a joke with him. He's a nice person, so I was kind of pissed when I saw him say that, but if he says that it was a situation where he was kind of taken out of context, then I believe him.
Nokaut.com: So we talked a little last week about how your mentality is that if it's something that can injure a joint or tear out something, you'll tap, but if you are going to sleep, you'll go to sleep. Was that what happened when Wes caught you in practice and what did he catch you with?
Zak Jensen: Yeah, Wes had a deep triangle on me and I tried to get out of it and before I knew it I was sleeping. I was literally snoring. (laughs) Wes has such long legs that the triangle is the perfect submission for him, so I got caught in the triangle and I was trying to fight out of it, but he just had it on too tight. He probably only had it on me for about twenty seconds or so before I went out, he had it that tight. I went out. It happens and like you saw when Marcus caught me in that armbar and I talked about how he had great hips and he popped it and I tapped, I'll tap an armbar because I want to keep fighting. If it's just going to sleep, I'll go to sleep. The thing with the oxygen was that I didn't want it, but the EMTs on staff there made me take it. I was telling them I wanted to get back to practicing and they were telling me that they wouldn't let me get back to practice without taking some of the oxygen for five minutes. They made me put the oxygen on. If you saw, I didn't even put it on or anything, they had to put it on me and I was just sitting there looking pissed as all hell. They didn't show it, but I was like "Wow, I'm that guy. I'm the guy that had to get oxygen during practice." I hate that guy. (laughs)
Nokaut.com: What did you think at the end of the segment when Rampage was talking about how you should be embarassed after that happened?
Zak Jensen: Well, Rampage talks about how he taps submissions, Sakuraba choked him out in PRIDE. He says that he didn't know the Japanese if they'd stop it once he was out so he'd rather tap than not know what's going on. That's him. Like I said, it happens, I got choked out, whoop-de-doo. I'm still walking around, it didn't prevent me from finishing the practice, it didn't prevent me from finishing out the rest of the show. That's just my weird, sick personality where I'm feeling like it's not going to break anything, so I just got choked out and I just have to wake up and get back at it.
Nokaut.com: When it came to the fight pick, were you hoping that you were going to get picked or were you feeling like you were on the block?
Zak Jensen: I wanted to fight the minute I got there, I wanted to be the first fight. I mean every time there was a fight pick, I wanted to get picked because sitting around practicing when you know you have a fight coming up but you don't know when it is is horrible. It's like you're getting ready for prom, but you don't have a date. Every time they had control, I thought they were going to pick me because they would think of me as the weakest link left. I got picked last, I had the cameraman picked before me, I was the seventeenth overall pick (laughs) so it was me basically wanting to fight. I wasn't like Marcus who got all angry when he didn't get picked, I just chalked it up to maybe next time. I wanted to fight but I didn't get picked, but I was there to fight. If I wasn't, I never would have gotten onto the plane to go to Las Vegas in the first place.
Nokaut.com: When was the fight pick made in terms of the timing, was it a couple of days before the actual fight?
Zak Jensen: Yeah, it was they made the pick, the next day they weighed in and then they fought, so the fight was two days after the pick.
Nokaut.com: How insufferable was Wes during those two days leading up to the fight after he was picked?
Zak Jensen: He didn't stop. He was just his normal self whether he was fighting or not. The calendar was still going on, the shower thing still went on. Him coming up with the sniffing the shorts thing started. He's just Wes Sims and he doesn't stop. He's a one-man gag reel.
Nokaut.com: So it didn't get any worse leading to the fight, but stayed fairly even then?
Zak Jensen: It kind of tapered off a little because he was focusing on his fight, but once that was done he was right back on it.
Nokaut.com: Without giving anything away in terms of future fights, do you think that it was a bad idea to piss Marcus off the way that Rashad did, no matter how small the slight was or if there even was a slight perceived by Marcus?
Zak Jensen: Well, if you watched it, Rashad never told Marcus that he'd be fighting, he just told Marcus that they might have a spot for him. Marcus kind of took it as him being picked and that was how he interpreted it. I think the fact that he got angry when he didn't get picked showed everyone that he was there to fight, so I think it was beneficial for him to be acting that way. He wears his heart on his sleeve so you could tell that he was upset. When Marcus was upset, you could generally tell. Marcus was a great guy, but you could tell what he was feeling because it would show. The fact that he reacted that way showed me that he was there to fight.
Nokaut.com: They've kind of shown Matt as being someone that they think might not have his heart completely into it so far. Was that feeling talked about in the house at all when they were talking about Marcus or Matt?
Zak Jensen: When you look at Marcus and Matt, they're complete opposites. Marcus, he gets beat up and he finishes all of the practices and never once was he wanting to ice something or whatever. If Marcus was walking around, he was practicing. He walked around that one time when his knee was a little sore, but even then he came back and finished the practice. With Matt, if your shoulder hurts that bad, why are you playing catch and why are you shooting hoops? You know, if you're going around saying that you're injured and then you're going and doing all of that other stuff, if you saw someone doing that wouldn't you be wondering what the hell was going on? I'm not saying that he wasn't hurt because I don't know how bad it was because it wasn't me, but the way he was acting outside of practice and at the house, he was the one that was acting that way so it's his fault that people were giving him crap for it.
Nokaut.com: What did you think about the Wes/Justin match-up and how were you feeling about the fight heading into it?
Zak Jensen: If you look at Wes Sims, he's fought Frank Mir twice, UFC veteran, almost forty fights, he's got great experience. Justing, just turned 22 before we went into the house, got nine fights. If you look at the experience, it's a great fight for us in terms of trying to turn things around so we were happy with the pick. Justin went out, took him down and popped on that arm triangle and did his job. Wes tried to block it, but Justin had it so tight, so fast, he just went to sleep. He was probably out and asleep for about ten or fifteen seconds before Herb Dean stopped it, which just shows that Herb Dean is not exactly the best referee in the world.
Nokaut.com: I was actually going to ask you about that as you brought up Herb Dean's refereeing before, so is there something in your career previous where you've had a bad experience with Herb as the referee and has he ever worked any of your fights?
Zak Jensen: He's never reffed any of my fights, but watching him not stop the fight when Kimbo was taking those forty-four straight punches in the first round, even though he wasn't getting hurt, he wasn't intelligently defending himself. It wasn't as bad as when Miragliotta was reffing the Kimbo/James Thompson fight in EliteXC because James Thompson was actually hitting hard and Kimbo wasn't defending himself. That was horrible, but EliteXC was all about Kimbo so you know why that didn't get stopped. Dana White said himself though that he doesn't care who wins or loses and that he doesn't have control over it. That fight and having Wes be that passed out and not stopping it, I mean he checked Wes' hand and picked it up to see, but you know that anyone that knows Wes Sims, if he's okay in a submission, he's probably going to be giving everyone the finger. The fact that he wasn't doing that should have told Herb that he was already out. Wes is ok, it was just a blood choke, he doesn't have that big a brain to begin with so...(laughs)...he was just a little more goofy afterwards,but that's just Wes Sims.
Nokaut.com: Were you suprised with how quickly Justin was able to take control of the fight and how quickly it ended?
Zak Jensen: I was surprised. I knew that Justin would be able to take him down because Justin is a great wrestler, but I was shocked over how it happened. Justin impressed a lot of people and even Dana White said he was impressed with him. If Dana says that he's impressed with someone, they did a good job.
Nokaut.com: Your coach posted a blog today about how he felt like the editing in the show was kind of going out of their way to make him look bad against Rashad on the show. Do you feel like it's a fairly accurate rendering of how things have been going with Team Rampage and their coach thus far?
Zak Jensen: You know it's like I said, Rampage is a great guy but he says he's not a coach. It makes him look worse than he is sometimes because he'd actually put the time in and say something about something that worked in one of his fights and maybe it would work for whoever he was talking to. He was trying to coach, he's just not a coach. All of our coaches were great coaches, we had great coaches, they were just making it seem like Rampage was running the practices and the weren't running. We were busting our asses with three-a-days. Rashad's team was only doing two-a-days so we were working hard and were getting everything we needed, it just wasn't panning out in the cage. They are making it look worse than it was. He helped as much as he could, but it's not like he doesn't care about us. After the fights, he gets frustrated because he's a fighter and he hates losing. It looks worse than it was watching it back. Watching it back, it actually makes me kind of angry because when it was happening I was focusing on getting ready for my stuff so I wasn't paying too much attention to it in the house, but watching it again it kind of makes me angry. Rampage is a great guy and if I could help him, I'd give him the shirt off my back because that's the kind of nice guy that he is. He's just not a coach and he admits it. He did everything he could for us as a coach, but Rashad is the better coach. He could get that aspect of it down. It's definitely making Rashad look better than Rampage, but I think that it was helping to set up the fight that isn't really going to happen now.
Nokaut.com: So what can we expect next week in terms of what happens with you and the rest of the guys picking at you in the house and all of that?
Zak Jensen: Wes Sims continues to go on with his storytelling, so I get some more face time. (laughs) When they say about Kimbo might get back into the tournament because someone gets hurt, I'm the one that's grabbing my face. If you see the opening credits with me bleeding, that's when it happened. They show that and then Kimbo gets all happy so Kimbo might be fighting again, who knows, you'll just have to tune in and check it out.
Nokaut.com: Well that pretty much covers it for us this week so if there's anyone you wanted to thank or any appearances you wanted to plug, it's all you.
Zak Jensen: Yeah, I wanted to thank Gorilla Combat where I train back home in Minnesota and last night I got to watch the show and make an appearance at The Mad Hatter in Muncie, IN, so I'd like to thank those guys for having me out.
Nokaut.com: That's great Zak. Thanks again for taking the time and we'll talk to you next week!
Zak Jensen: Thank you and I look forward to talking to you again next week.
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