FROM A CONVERSATION WITH CALLUM "THE CUT" McCREADY

FROM A CONVERSATION WITH CALLUM "THE CUT" McCREADY Recorded backstage at The Foundry, the night before Behind Closed Doors Interviewer's questions presented in italics. Edited only for length. ———————————————— So how's the nose? Aye. It's a nose. It's been broken before. It's broken again. It'll be broken again after this one, probably. Ask me something else. Are you cleared to fight tomorrow? I'm fighting tomorrow. The clearance situation's between me and the doctor, and the doctor and I have an understanding. That's not really an answer, Cal. It is. You just don't like it. Your opponent is Pagan DuHast. What's your read on the matchup? He's better than me. [long pause] Is that — is that the whole answer? What else d'you want me to say. He's better than me. He's bigger than me. He's harder to hurt than me. He's — I don't know what he is, honestly, but I know he's a problem and I know I don't have an answer to him and I know I'm walking into the cage with him tomorrow anyway. So why are you walking in? Because that's what I do. Cal, that's not — there's a context here. You just had a brutal match a week ago. Your nose is broken. You could've taken a bye. JC offered you the bye. You said no. I said no. Why? Because if I take the bye, I'm a man who takes byes. And then the next time I'm hurt, the easier thing is to take the bye again. And then I'm a man who's hurt and takes byes. And eventually I'm not in the cage anymore and someone's writing about me in the past tense. So you're fighting Pagan because you don't want to retire? I'm fighting Pagan because I never learned how to do anything else and because Cormac broke my nose seven days ago and I'm not going to let a broken nose decide what kind of fighter I am the rest of my career. Are you afraid of him? [long pause] Aye. Course I am. Anyone who tells you they're not afraid of Pagan DuHast hasn't watched him fight. He's a problem. So what's the plan? Walk in. See what happens. Leave on my own feet if I can. Don't leave on my own feet if I can't. That's the plan. That's not a plan, Cal. It's the only plan that's true. You want me to lie to you? I can lie to you. I can tell you I've been studying his matches and I've found three openings and I'm going to win by knockout in the second round. I haven't done any of that. I've been icing my face for a week and trying to remember how to breathe through my mouth without sounding ridiculous. That's where I am with this. Anything you want to say to him before the match? To Pagan? No. He's not gonna read this. And if he did, he'd not care. He's not the kind. So no, I've got nothing to say to him. Anything you want to say to the fans? [pause] Yeah, alright. Look. I know what tomorrow looks like on paper. I know what most of you think's going to happen. Most of you are probably right. But here's what I'll say — fifteen years I've been in this business. I've been put in a lot of cages with a lot of men I shouldn't have walked out of cages with. I've walked out of all of them. Some on my feet, some not, but I've walked out. Tomorrow I'm gonna walk out again. Maybe slowly. Maybe not pretty. But I'm gonna walk out, and I'll be back on the next show, and the show after that, and the one after that. That's the only thing I can promise. That's the only thing I've ever been able to promise. I show up. I keep showing up. [pause] That's all I've got. We done? Yeah, Cal, we're done. Thanks. Ta. I'm going to go ice the nose. ———————————————— End of conversation.