One-Eyed Baz

by Barrington Patterson

  When I took the piss out of Sander MacKilljan and beat him, they put me with a Russian guy who was totally different. After that, when I beat the Russian guy, I was fighting one of MacKilljan’s trainers; then I fought another guy who was a trainer of that guy, then another guy who was the trainer of that guy, and it just went on.

  For a couple of years, I did both kickboxing and MMA at once. Of course, a lot of promoters over here knew that I could pull a crowd. There were a lot of them asking me to fight, but the money wasn’t good so I preferred to go to Holland – the purse is much better in Holland plus it’s a weekend away. Say the show you’re fighting in is on a Sunday, the crowds are like 20- or 30-odd thousand people watching a fight. You’re fighting over here for a couple of hundred people and the promoters want to pay you peanuts. You’re there for a weekend, enjoying yourself, doing what you’ve got to do for a weekend, plus you’re fighting in front of a big crowd of people.

  After that, I had about six heavyweight MMA fights one after the other. MMA is unbelievable in terms of what the training demands from you; it’s a young man’s sport. I don’t think I could go through all that again for another fight. If I was weak on anything, it was the grappling work. I trained for it but I’m a fighter who would rather stand up and have it; I’ve always been 100 per cent confident when standing up, but probably only 50 per cent if gone to the ground. So I was always defensive against being taken down. The training is also a lot harder if you’re a ground fighter and it can take a lot out of you.

  DEV

  They were offering us money and Barrington wanted to fight – if there wasn’t money, there was still the opportunity to fight and a weekend away. So we went. But after we watched the other fights and we came back, then I realised there was a little bit more to it. So that’s when we started going to the MMA fighter Matthew Evans – rather than trying to learn it, I just said, ‘Right, we’re better off going to somebody who knows that stuff.’ So he would go to Mattie and learn the groundwork and we would do the stand-up stuff. So, when we would go back now to fight, I would take Mattie as a corner as well, rather than try to teach him something I don’t really know about.

  This is really going back, back, back – but at the very start Barrington used to fight in this ECKA (English Contact Karate Association) championship. So he fought in every discipline, which not many people can do. He fought in light contact, semi-contact, K-1 (Japanese kickboxing), full contact, cage fighting, kyokushinkai and free fighting – all at a very good level.

  After that, people just wanted to fight me and they all came from the same fucking gym! I fought one of my first opponents’ friends and his trainer after that. They were all from the same camp and they all wanted a shot at me. I felt good in myself because I’d taken my first opponent out in style and felt like I’d accomplished something. I beat him nicely and the crowd loved it. I was trying something different for the first time and I’d won. It had been mainly a stand-up fight and neither of us wanted to go to the floor. But to go further in MMA I knew I had to learn a lot more. There would be times when you had to go to the floor.

  I did judo for about four or five years, but this was a totally different thing. So I had to find somewhere that actually did the jiu-jitsu and all that and go and learn it, even though I didn’t like doing it. I had to train for the way I was fighting, though I would do all my fights standing up if I could.

  It did feel strange. If I was fighting and I’d got him on the ground, instead of jumping on him and trying to take him on the ground, I’d stand there and say, ‘Get up, man.’

  I continued with my kickboxing which helped with MMA, because all fights start standing up – you go to the floor if you’ve got to go to the floor. People in England had started to hear about me. My name had started to come through and the promoters were asking me to fight – ‘We’ll give you £200–300.’

  I thought, Fuck you, man! Why should I fight for that much when I can get six to seven grand fighting in Holland? That was the mistake I made in my career. I should have taken the smaller fights instead of relying on one fight a year. I should have taken those fights in England and used my experience when I went back to Holland. But I thought it was better to wait till the end of the year and earn six to seven grand.

  I then was asked to fight a Russian guy called Stanislav Nuschik who was a sambo wrestler – it’s a Russian style of wrestling and I knew he’d want to go to the floor. I was going to have to train even harder now, to do more groundwork. I trained for six weeks leading up to the fight. Everything was going brilliantly to plan. But this was a year after the first MMA fight, so it was a long time. It’s up to us if we want to do a bit extra, but I don’t research other fighters. I don’t try to study their personalities; I just try to take them as they come. Every fighter is different.

  The fight was in Holland. The hotel and food were lovely, and the reception I got at the airport was unbelievable. Even immigration asked me for my autograph. I thought, Fuck me, I must be getting better! I’d made a name for myself in kickboxing and now I was doing the same in MMA. The reception was very different from the first fight now that I had a reputation.

  Everywhere you go in Holland there are MMA posters. It’s more established and you get crowds of 20,000, including families and even footballers coming to watch shows. Apart from football, it’s all kickboxing and MMA over there. It’s big time!

  I had media interviews before the fight; I had to do a medical and a weigh-in too. Everything went to plan. It was the same as any other fight: get up in the morning; have some breakfast; go for a walk. Everything was still the same and I tried not to change anything. The girl I was seeing at the time came with me, which was nice. (I can’t remember which girl – I got through so many!) Andre came again and so did my mate Mattie Evans – who’s a Coventry bloke who’s had a few fights and is a good teacher. He was one of the people trained by Geoff Thompson, who used to be a doorman and did that book Watch My Back.

  Outside the stadium was chock-a-block. I walked around meeting people, signed a few autographs and had pictures taken with the crowd. I got back to the changing room and had a rest, then had another walk outside the stadium. I like to walk around and have a laugh with my trainers.

  At one of my weigh-ins, it had kicked off before the fight. I’ve had a few altercations like that, but for this fight the weigh-in was normal. We’d had our photos taken and shook hands – ‘See you on the date.’

  Just before the fight, I got changed, put on my gloves and box and wore shorts this time. I did wear trousers for the first fight, but you should try to fight as light as possible really. When you go back to your corner, you are heavy with sweat and retained water.

  Nuschik came out first. Then my music came on and I was dancing and jumping around. My mates in the background were shouting, ‘ZULU! ZULU! ZULU!’ I came out strutting my stuff, with two showgirls dancing by the side of me. I was just playing to the crowd and they were fucking loving it! Then the music stopped and it was time to get down to business.

  The ref called us out to fight. We shook hands. As soon as the guy came out, he went straight for my legs. I thought, Fucking hell, this guy’s fast, man! So I stayed centre of the ring and started kicking – kicking – kicking. As soon as he shot forward, I’d step back and hit him with a low kick. This went on till the end of the first round.

  I went back to my corner and Dev said, ‘You gotta stop him, you gotta stop him!’ This is where my kickboxing came in – because I’d been kicking him in the legs, in the second round he just couldn’t stand up. He was on the floor, so I jumped on him and started pounding him. I gave him about six or seven punches and the ref stopped the fight. I strutted my stuff around the ring, waving to the crowd, blowing kisses.

  All I heard was ‘Patterson Zulu! Patterson Zulu!’ It was good to use my kickboxing experience, it still came in useful. I won that one nice and easy, but I knew there were bigger fish to fry.

  At the after party, I didn
’t say much to the Russian, but we had a good time. Our girlfriends were there, we were drinking and I’d won two out of two. It was a little more money this time and the 20,000 crowd had been great.

  On the Monday, I caught the plane back to Birmingham International. I had a big trophy in my hand and people kept asking where I’d got it – which was nice. I went home and just chilled out with the missus and the kids. It was lovely but I couldn’t wait for my third fight.

  A couple of months later, the promoter rang me and said, ‘I’ve got a guy who says he wants to fight you.’

  ‘Who is this fucking guy?’

  ‘He’s called Hans Nijman.’ He was the trainer of the first MMA fighter I fought. The promoter said he’d been shouting his mouth off in Holland about fighting me. The first time he was looking for me, I was going through a lot of shit with my wife and got into loads of fucking trouble. I went through hell and it ended by me getting locked up in prison.

  I was married to my second wife, Linda, at the time. After a while, I’d started working a bit in Spain, doing security for the rave scene over there and then coming back over here. I was working at rave clubs like Manumission and Es Paradis in Ibiza. Guys there used to say to me, ‘How the fuckin’ hell you stay awake?’

  I’d say, ‘Listen, as long as I’ve got my black coffee and my girls around me, I’ll be all right.’ I was never into taking drugs to stay awake. When I saw guys on pills or sniff or whatever, I would just take a step back and really look at those people. I’d think to myself, Fuckin’ hell, man, all this big hard-man rep! They were not big hard-men any more because they were off their faces on the pills: ‘All right mate, how yer doing? Kiss kiss!’ And that’s when a lot of faces that would have been rivals now became friendly with one another.

  When I was in back in Coventry, I saw the acid-house scene get massive. Everyone was getting together under one roof and just kissing each other, shaking or joining hands and loving each other. All the lads were at it: Coventry Legion guys, Villa. Amnesia was a big club on the rave scene at the time, but one of the guys there committed suicide.

  I may not have been into the raves, but I was messing around a bit in my private life. When you’re messing around though, you don’t expect your wife to be messing around too!

  So I ended up finding her out. I found the boyfriend, kicked her mum’s door in, went in there, hammered him – as you do, right? I was on bail conditions to keep away from the house after that. Everything leads off from there: it was a messy divorce; I had an injunction to keep away from her, so every time I rang there or went round the house to pick up my things she’d call the police and say, ‘He came round the house, he’s sitting outside in his car, he’s driving next to me in the road, he’s chasing me in his car.’ I’m getting pulled every week for silly little things: me and my mate got dragged on to the floor by armed police because I was supposed to be driving round with a bloody gun in my car – and all they caught me with was a machete. When I went to court, they had to give me my machete back.

  MAL

  His ex went off with another bloke; he was at home and Barrington phoned the house. He goes to Barrington, ‘Who the fuck do you think you are?’ Barrington says, ‘I’ll show you who the fuck I am!’ He goes down there, kicks down the front door and then kicks this guy in the face, knocks him out. The police get called: 27 red dots on his body, that’s how they dealt with Barrington.

  There was this other guy and he had a bit of beef with Barrington; he bottled him on his head. Whenever he saw him, Barrington would beat the shit out of him; he’d just say to remind him whenever we saw him.

  So I ended up splitting up from her; I had numerous other girls on the side and ended up seeing one called Lucy. But all of a sudden I pissed Linda off one day and she told the police. I ended up getting locked up for five or six weeks in Winson Green. Dev came up and said what he had to say in court.

  DEV

  He was in a cell on remand and he was supposed to be going away in three weeks to fight. Because he had this big fight, I knew he was good and ready and there was potential for him to become a regular fighter and make a good living. So I took the fight contract over, spoke to his solicitor and showed them what getting locked up was going to do to him. I wasn’t 100 per cent sure that I got through, because they might have said, ‘Oh well, his loss – he knew he had these things coming up, why did he jeopardise it?’ But the judge didn’t want to take that chance away from him, which was fantastic. That was one thing that I understand stopped him from going to prison. It was coming up; he was going to fight Hans Nijman and we had the contract. I was on the phone to the promoters saying, ‘He might be, he might not be,’ and in the end he got out. Thanks to the justice system!

  A couple of times, when he’s had a row in town and he’s going to sort someone out, just through respect I’ve been able to say, ‘Hey, come on, Barrington – leave it! It’s not worth it! What are you going to gain except a prison sentence?’ He actually listens. Barrington has got a heart of gold and I have seen him in tears. But he has a reputation and I suppose few people have seen that side of him. The way that people talk about him makes it seem worse.

  Deep down, he is a gentle giant, but on the other side he is like a lion that is almost tamed. I trust him; he is reliable. When he has lost a fight, he takes it well, with no excuses. He has respected, supported and stayed loyal to ECKA, our karate and kickboxing organisation. The kids at the dojo think the world of him.

  If it wasn’t for having my friends and trainers around me, I’d probably be the same person now as I was back then. Dev turned up in court and said a lot for me, telling the court I had an important fight coming up. Prison was all right though – I was sound, as soon as I got in there I knew a lot of people and a lot of people knew me. The only thing was that I couldn’t train. You can punch the bags but you can’t kick them.

  All I could think about was my wife and my kids. It really fucked my head up, but I’d broken my bail conditions for about four or five different charges and was on remand for six weeks. The food was shit too. Usually, when I train, I get up early and have a bowl of porridge with a couple of bananas. After I’ve trained, I’ll have a couple of boiled eggs with some toast and a cup of coffee. But after 7pm I won’t eat any carbs, just protein. I might have some fish or eggs, maybe an apple too, but I don’t eat that much at that time of night.

  In prison, I just kept thinking, I want this fight, I want this fight, I wanna get out! On the day of my trial, my trainer Dev turned up at court with all these fucking papers. He told the judge, ‘Barrington’s got a really important fight on this date,’ and showed the poster. When I got a conditional discharge I thought, Fucking nice one, Dev! I’d really thought I was going to get sent down. But I got out – and knocked Nijman the fuck out!

  * * *

  So I was up against one of the top fighters in Holland at the time. I’d just split up with my wife and all I could think about in prison was having this fight and getting out to see my kids. I came out on the Wednesday and had to go to Holland on the Friday to fight on the Sunday. There wasn’t much training I could do in two days and, even if I did, it wouldn’t make much of a difference. I knew deep down in my heart I could go out there and win – even without the training. I was in the mood anyway. I’m a fighter and my heart was already there.

  Nijman was one of the first MMA fighters in Holland and this guy was deadly. Dev showed me a video of him and he had a lethal kick on him. On Friday, we flew from Birmingham International and the promoter met us at Amsterdam airport. I just chilled out and went out at night, had a little perv around Amsterdam – as you do. I got back in nice and early as Dev was on my case: ‘You gotta be back in by 12 o’clock.’ I got in about two.

  The next day, I had to do the regular TV interviews, the medical, meet the other fighter and have pictures taken. Then I was free to do what I wanted. I just chilled out and played cards with my friends.

  On Sunday, the weigh-in was
all right. We shook hands. Everything was fine and there were about 300 people there. To tell the truth, I don’t think anyone gave me much of a chance for this fight. Dev said, ‘If he catches you with that kick, you’re gonna get knocked out.’ He was the favourite.

  I came out first, turned and looked at him. I thought, Fuck you, you’re going down, ya cunt! He’d been giving it all that, speaking on Dutch TV: ‘Barrington thinks he can come over here and take the piss out of other fighters.’ I think he thought I was trying to disrespect them by talking when I was fighting, but this was good press and the promoters could blow it up a bit.

  The fucking crowd were unbelievable! I’ve never seen anything like it. Twenty-odd thousand were there and there was a small section from Groningen all cheering for me. I think the whole of Amsterdam was cheering for him.

  DEV

  There were a few locals cheering for him as well, because Nijman was working on the doors and he’s one of these characters who wasn’t that well liked. There were people who were for Barrington totally, even though he was the guest or the foreigner. They were saying that Barrington was the first foreigner they’d taken to; the Dutch fighter usually always gets the crowd more than anybody else, but in the fights they always cheered more for him.