Ex-WEC champ Gabe Ruediger set for retirement fight, discusses biggest regret

Heading into Friday’s fight – his retirement fight – former WEC champion Gabe Ruediger knows it could be easy to dwell on the embarrassments and missed opportunities and the often-relentless criticism that plagued his career.

But this week, as the 11-year vet prepares for his final trip to the cage, he’d rather focus on the positives.

“I’ve had a lot of ups and quite a few downs too,” he told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “But I’ve been fighting for 11 years, and I’ve gone through two major surgeries. I had my neck fused in 2008, and I had back surgery in 2011. I just feel like I can’t put any more punishment on my body. It’s time to move on to other avenues.

“I’m pretty set on being done with it, but I’m OK with that.”

Ruediger (17-8) looks to close his career in winning fashion when he meets Scott Catlin (8-7) in a 160-pound catchweight fight on Friday at “BAMMA USA: Badbeat 9? in Commerce, Calif. It’s his second fight for the promotion, which is based in his home state. The 35-year-old expects to see many friends and family there for the occasion.

“It’s my retirement fight,” he said. “It’s the last fight of my career, so I’ll probably have about 200 people there who will come out and see me do it one more time.”

Ruediger, of course, has his regrets. They’ve been pretty well-documented, after all. He famously flamed out of “The Ultimate Fighter 5? after failing to make weight for a fight. The footage of him was brutal and included Ruediger eating ice-cream cake when learning of the fight, asking for a colonic to make weight, and then being dragged into the sauna before coach B.J. Penn and teammate Gray Maynard considered him a lost cause and gave up. He was then kicked out of the “TUF” house.

A subsequent booking for the 2007 K-1 Dynamite!! USA event never materialized because Ruediger couldn’t be cleared in time. But he then won six straight fights and miraculously earned his way back to the UFC, only to be badly beaten by Joe Lauzon and Paul Taylor, which prompted another release.

There are other gaffes and setbacks. Ruediger remembers them. He knows you remember them too. Even today, the ice-cream cake saga comes back to haunt him.

So if he could do it again, what would he do differently?

“The problem is that you can’t go back and change anything,” he said. “I certainly feel ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ would probably be the No. 1. I also probably wouldn’t have taken the Joe Lauzon fight. That was when my back was out, and I took it on two weeks’ notice. But then again, who knows? Maybe I never would have gotten back to the UFC.”

And that’s something he can take solace in. Even before he was on “TUF 5,” Ruediger had earned – on merit – a UFC contract. He was the second WEC lightweight champion (after Gilbert Melendez) and made two title defenses – a record he holds with Hermes Franca and Jamie Varner – with an overall 5-1 mark in the organization. He subsequently suffered a loss to Melvin Guillard at UFC 63, but UFC officials thought enough of him to give him the “TUF” spot anyway.

And even after the organization axed him and UFC President Dana White expressed his disgust with the “TUF 5? departure, Ruediger fought his way back to the organization.

Not many folks can do that. He was a punching bag and a punchline, but again, he earned his way back based on his performances.

So as Ruediger hangs up his glove for the final times – and continues to run two jiu-jitsu schools and work with young fighters while pondering what’s next – he’s focusing on those positives.

“It’s not really a matter of what I would have down differently,” he said. “I’ve had some amazing experiences and met some amazing people, and I got to do things things I never, ever imagined.

“I got to the UFC not only once but twice. I didn’t have much success there, but I got there twice after a lot of adversity. That was much more than I ever expected.”

MMAjunkie.com Radio broadcasts Monday-Friday at noon ET (9 a.m. PT) live from Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino’s Race & Sports Book. The show is hosted by “Gorgeous” George Garcia, MMAjunkie.com lead staff reporter John Morgan and producer Brian “Goze” Garcia. For more information or to download past episodes, go to www.mmajunkie.com/radio.