Adding to this Rocky-like tale of Chris Weidman is the fact that he was left homeless by Hurricane Sandy, and was left with no money as he trained for the biggest fight of his life. Sometimes, storybook tales do become true, and we have to look no further than Chris Weidman to see it. You may have been disappointed to see Anderson lose, but you can’t deny how incredible it is for Weidman to win.
Weidman’s grappling coach John Danaher:
“He was essentially homeless, he was financially completely bankrupt. I remember I had to lend Chris thousands of dollars out of my own pocket just to keep him solvent while he’s preparing to fight Silva. And his life was essentially in chaos. One day when people know the full story of what happened, I’m not kidding when I say this, it’s like a goddamn Hollywood movie. It’s Rocky Balboa. It’s insane.”
“The guy had nine fights. Bankrupt. Homeless. With a completely broken shoulder. As far as I’m aware the only guy who came off of major surgery and won his next fight was Georges St-Pierre – and Georges had more than twice the amount of healing time that Chris did. He got a full year and a half off. Chris had six months.”