His Passion for MMA Rekindled, Brandon Girtz Plots Revenge at Bellator 146

When Bellator MMA lightweight Brandon Girtz reflects on his fight on June 19, 2013, he remembers having no clue about his next move. He was unsure if he even wanted to continue fighting for a living and wondered whether or not he should venture down a different path. He admits he had no idea what he was doing, and this was in the midst of defending punches, elbows, kicks and takedowns being thrown at him at full speed on the Bellator 96 undercard.

Girtz was distracted by personal struggles while trading blows with Derek Campos and lost a unanimous decision. When he exited the cage, he doubted he would ever fight again.

“I was at a crossroads in my life back then, and I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with myself,” Girtz told Sherdog.com. “The training wasn’t going how I wanted it to go, and mentally, I just wasn’t at the right place. Even when I was in that fight -- literally while I was fighting -- I wasn’t sure if this was something I wanted to do. If you’re not truly in this sport, you’re doing a disservice to yourself and to the fans. This sport is way too hard to just go through the motions, and I paid for it by losing that fight.”

The Minnesotan had an epiphany shortly thereafter, one that forced him to correct his mistakes and take his career by the proverbial horns. Girtz knew he needed a complete change of scenery if he wanted to make an actual living out of MMA, and he could ill afford anymore setbacks.

“The night after my fight, I was sitting down at dinner with my dad and I told him, ‘I think I’m done fighting,’” he said. “He asked me what I was going to do moving forward, but he said it in a way that was like, ‘You’re not done.’ That was the major turning point for me. After that, I decided that this is what I wanted to do, so I made some major changes. I moved out to Colorado and began training at Grudge Training Center, and it’s been the biggest change of my life. It wasn’t like where I used to train was wrong at all; it’s just that I needed to pick myself up and completely change my life, my surroundings, everything. I needed to put myself in a completely new atmosphere and re-focus on everything.”

The decision appears to have paid off. Though he was knocked out by Derek Anderson at Bellator 113 -- a loss about which he has made no excuses -- Girtz has since recorded back-to-back wins, both of them in Bellator. In his most recent appearance at Bellator 141 in August, he recorded an upset victory over Ultimate Fighting Championship veteran Melvin Guillard. Girtz admits it marked another turning point in his career, as it let him know he could compete with some of the best fighters in the division. He has focused his attention on getting better.

Next, he gets a chance to exact some revenge on Campos, as they meet in a rematch at Bellator 146 on Friday at the Winstar World Casino and Resort in Thackerville, Okla. Girtz expects to have his hand raised when all is said and done, and Campos has endured his own struggles in the cage. He has dropped two of his last three fights, one by submission, the other by knockout. Still, Girtz anticipates a difficult fight.

“He needs to come in there as the best Derek Campos there is,” he said. “He knows that. He knows what’s in front of him, and I expect him to come in there as hard as he can. It doesn’t really matter how he comes at me, but I’d like him to be more aggressive. I think aggressive fighters tend to bring out the best in me, so I would like him to do that.”

Girtz concedes there is a certain amount of discomfort to training for someone he has already fought. However, he believes his game has grown more than his opponent’s.

“I don’t like to talk about Derek in a negative light or try to speak about him, because over the years, Derek and I have created sort of a friendship,” Girtz said. “I don’t like to say stuff about him because he’s a cool dude, but I don’t see much change in his game at all. I feel as though I’ve advanced, but he hasn’t. When I look at our fight from two and a half years ago and then look at his fights now, I think he goes out there and fights the same exact way. I’m a lot different now compared to then.”