No Longer His Own Boss, Miguel Torres Turns to Firas Zahabi for WEC 51

Filed under: WEC

BROOMFIELD, Colo. - Brad Pitt, as Tyler Durden in "Fight Club," says, "It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything."

To say Miguel Torres "lost everything" might be something of a stretch. But after back-to-back losses for the first time in a career spanning 40 professional fights (and a dozen others that exist off the books), Torres definitely reached that type of moment of critical mass.

After years of training himself at his Torres Martial Arts Academy in Hammond, Ind., near his hard-luck, blue-collar hometown of East Chicago, Torres was living the good life as his own boss. Sure, he made sporadic trips to drill with coaches like Robert Drysdale and Mark DellaGrotte. He rolled with Frank Mir and Kenny Florian, Rashad Evans and Kurt Pellegrino.

But when you've never been knocked out and someone pops you in the chin and puts you to sleep and takes your gold, and when you've never been made to quit and someone cracks your head open and chokes you until you tap ... it must feel like you've lost everything. So you go out and get a coach.

Gerard Rond Jean Sebastien Roy Alex Salvini Donny Schmit Fritz Schneider