From football to MMA (Michael Westbroo)

Exerpts

Players punt ball, ready for the ring

February 15, 2005

Michael Westbrook said he lost his love for the sport that made him famous. But he hasn’t lost his love of competition.

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Westbrook, a Detroit native best remembered in college for the Hail Mary catch that helped Colorado beat Michigan in a 1994 football game, is headlining a mixed martial arts card in Cleveland on Feb. 25.

Westbrook’s opponent will be Jarrod Bunch, a former Michigan and New York Giants fullback.

In mixed martial arts bouts, fighters wear 4-ounce fingerless gloves and incorporate skills from judo, kick-boxing, boxing and Olympic wrestling.

Westbrook, a big boxing fan who grew up down the street from the famed Kronk gym, said he has been training in martial arts for 12 years. He said he won three jujitsu tournaments and is looking forward to his fight against Bunch, 36.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/sports/20050215-9999-lz1s15galry.html

Why not? Football seems to have good cross-over to MMA.

Many more articles coming later! Need sleep now.

Edit: Missed a ‘k’

i bet he probably has a pretty good tackle …

His conditioning from football should serve him well.

And ANOTHER story about him.
Exposure is increasing.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/sports/20050216-123426-7471r.htm

Still fighting

By Bob Cohn
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

TEMPE, Ariz. – No one has been voted the most unpopular Washington Redskins player of recent times. Had such a poll been taken, the likely winner - or loser - can be seen nightly at a suburban strip mall, inside a gym called Arizona Combat Sports, sweating and grunting and occasionally taking one on the chin.
Some unforgiving fans might believe Michael Westbrook deserves such treatment for how he presumably let everyone down, symbolized the futility of the post-Joe Gibbs Redskins and left a trail of ill will in his wake.

Sounds like he’s serious about getting the skills to be legit. No Bob Sapp.

There are probably more MA in football than any other NON-MA sport.

Rugby is another one. Lots of ex-rugby guys in my old dojo in Albuquerque.

I lived in DC when Westbrook and Davis “fought.” By all accounts, Westbrook jumped him by surprise and Davis never had a chance.