Ex-NFL Linebacker Anthony Wint Is Ready for His UFC Debut

All right, man, it's been a hell of a couple of weeks for you.

A week ago, you were fighting for a contract, and now this Saturday making your UFC debut.

Has any of this really sunk in for you yet?

Not at all, to be honest with you .

It's like, it's like I'm in a dream and that they just keep continuing.

What a difference 7 weeks makes.

Before I was a prospect that maybe some people knew about, but now, some people say I'm the biggest prospect out right now.

I don't wanna listen to them.

I don't wanna listen to Nate.

The great thing is Saturday, we get to prove it.

We go out there and put on a show, and Terrence Chapman is the only thing keeping me from my next step.

For sure, after your fight on the contender series, you said you wanted to fight right away.

Did you expect Dana to take you up on the offer so quickly?

Not only did I expect that, I demanded it.

You , you don't, you don't understand.

Dana didn't have a choice.

I think when you go out there and perform the way I did, when you go out there and put on a show, when you go out there and, you know, you're not a, a buffoon on a microphone, that's what the UFC wants.

It's a, it's a, it's a sport in a sense of competition and being a professional, but it's also marketing.

Paramount Point wants to sell tickets, they wanna put seats and butts, and when you build.

The story, the best thing to do is continue to let it ride.

They don't want you to sit at home for 3 months or 4 months or 5 months.

He wants you to be as active as possible and as long as we can continue to get out there unscathed, I can fight every week.

I just wanna ask you about the moment when you got the call, like, where were you?

How did it all happen when you just get your contract and then you get the call, like, where were you?

How did that conversation go?

Was it yes right away?

Um, after, after Dana announced that I was getting a contract, which was a no-brainer, and he came up and shook all of our hands, I grabbed his hand real tight, I leaned in and I said, yo, I'm not going home.

He said, all right, we're gonna work on it.

And the, I wouldn't say he was afraid, but I could feel his pulse through his hand.

I was like, All right, he's not lying.

It's almost like a, it's like a built-in lie detector.

I was like, that man, he's a man of his word, he's gonna make it happen.

So, at that point, I was just figuring out my agent.

We extended my hotel, we canceled my flight.

At worst case scenario, we had a flight home that next Sunday, but I wasn't gonna get on it.

I, I don't know where Dana lives.

He might, he probably has multiple houses.

I was gonna, I was gonna hide out in his garage and I was gonna wake him up in the middle of the night.

Yeah, why, why not?

If you don't wanna, you wanna pay the man.

I love it.

So, you know, you're like, you put in this entire fight camp for your contender series fight, and then it's over in 34 seconds.

Does that, is there, is that ever like a letdown?

Obviously, you wanna go in there and get the win, but you put in the camp for 34 seconds and then it's over.

I'll tell you two things.

One, Only letdown was that I didn't put him face down.

He took a shot.

I had to, I had to take him down because he tried to trip me.

But I wonder, he, he got two options, just like Dana had two options.

He got face up or face down.

That's usually my goal because it looks the best and I feel like it glorifies God the best.

But the second thing is like, like you said, I trained so much, we're conditioned like crazy cause the game plan to beat me is to make me tired, but we're well-conditioned, and when I go in there, I'm tired.

I got so much energy and then it's over.

That adrenaline does not just go anywhere.

I, in the end, just like you see me right now, the adrenaline, like this x 10, the adrenaline's up, my voice is up.

As you see after the fight, I'm hopping around, jumping around because my body's like, yo, we made it.

What are we gonna do now?

So, that's the only thing, man.

I think, and I'm not gonna be bold and say something crazy like this, but Just have somebody backed up after the fight just in case, you know, I can fight somebody else like come on, 22, but let me not say that.

Let me not be that, that bigheaded.

I'm not, I'm not there yet.

Maybe in a couple months.

Gotta worry about Terrence first.

I wanna talk to you.

There, there's a parallel, the heavyweight division is very interesting right now, right?

We have.

Whatever they have to work out at the top with Aspinall.

But another guy, Josh Hoki, a little bit of a parallel with you, used to be in the NFL on the 49ers practice squad, and now he's kind of taken the division by storm.

What do you make of his rise, and do you see any similarities between you two?

Outside of him being on offense and me being on defense, there's a lot of similarities.

Um, uh, Josh has done an amazing job, very similar story, practice squad, cut, not, not knowing what to do, more of a wrestling background than me, and then came in here and dominated.

He knows what the UFC wants.

Now, granted, would I operate in this kind of fictional world that Josh operates?

No , but to each their own.

I'll tell you what, Josh has made more money than me.

Going into the UFC, his pockets are a lot deeper than most of the heavyweight division, so I'm not, for lack of a better term, gonna sell my soul for clicks or for views or to get clicks or whatever else, but Josh is a very dangerous man.

He's a man who can wrestle, he's a man who has hands, he's a man who believes in himself, and I'm in a sense, following his footsteps, but eventually, both of those ships are gonna meet each other.

Both of those trains are gonna collide and One's gonna have to divert, so we gotta take care of Terrence Chapman.

And once we do that, we can think about who's next and next.

Josh is out here probably gonna fight for the title or fight a legend in Alex Barrero.

He ain't worry about me, but the time will come.

We'll be, we'll be on each other's radar, and then we'll get to talk about it.

Well, you said all these heavyweights should be shaking in their boots, right?

Yeah, yeah, all right.

Um, do you think that you and Hawkin are showing like there's a, uh, there's a new kind of breed of heavyweight coming into the UFC, more athletic, maybe a little bit smaller than some of these bigger, fatter guys?

I think, I don't think we're showing, I think we're re-establishing it.

Stipe was a small heavyweight.

Daniel Cormier, even though he would get big, was a smaller heavyweight.

You got all these guys, uh, uh, I Ilya, I, I don't , I forget his name, but he was a, a Russian or a European.

He was a smaller heavyweight.

You don't need much to beat these big guys.

You need to have skill, you need to know how to grapple just a little bit.

You need to know fighting and know how to get hit and not how to hit and not get hit.

That's pretty much it.

Don't let these big guys bully you.

Yeah.

And then last one for me, man, I know this is your last interview of the day.

After Saturday night in Sacramento, UFC fans seeing you for the first time, what do you want them to remember about you?

I want them to enjoy the show.

I want to give them their popcorn.

I want them not to blink cause who knows how fast it's gonna end.

By the end of the day, I want them to know that even though I'm an MMA fighter, even though I fight with my hands, knees, and elbows, they are fighters too.

You've been through stuff, Doug.

You've been stuff through life where it, you didn't think you were gonna get up.

You didn't think you would get past that trial.

You didn't think that you will get to the point where you can have joy and happy again.

And I stand here today as a man who was cut by the NFL, cried in my car with a garbage bag to the right of me, and said, man, I'm never gonna be good again.

I'm never gonna be what God called me to be, and I can sit here today saying, I can be even more than I think because of the God I serve, man.

So I want them to know that with God all things are possible and anything they put their mind to, they can do.

I love it.

Can I ask you about the dagger before I let you go?

So, as you can see, I have, I almost stabbed myself.

I have a brand, it's called the Warrior's Wardrobe or Warrior's Way Wins.

After my fight with Miles Banks, I was reading the story of David found at 1 Samuel chapter 17, and David, before, after he slide the slake alive, he took his own sword and cut his head off with it.

So I'm gonna beat every opponent with what they think they can beat me with.

They think they're big, they think they're strong, they think they're athletic.

I'm gonna take my sword and not only knock them out, but I'm gonna take their whole mindset off and hand it to God and say, here it is.

I'm, I'm not, I think I had, I heard in the, the pre-fight for the Dana White's Contender series, he's not just beating people, he's snatching souls, and I can only snatch souls with the Holy Spirit, the Ruak, and this is my sword, and I, I carry it in the battle everywhere I go.

Love it, man.

Anthony Wick, and look, this Saturday night, man, can't wait to see you do your thing, man.

Appreciate you, Doug.

You guys stay sharp.