Steven Siler Happy to Put Bad Blood with Miller Brothers Behind Him

It was a family affair at UFC on FX 2 when Steven Siler met Cole Miller in Australia.

Months earlier, Siler surprised just about everybody when he submitted Miller’s brother Micah to gain entry into The Ultimate Fighter Season 14 house. After the fight, reports surfaced that Micah Miller had contracted food poisoning and it affected his performance during the TUF tryouts.

Siler didn’t win the reality show, but he did win his fight on the finale against Josh Clopton, and it almost seemed like a natural fit to have him matched up with Micah’s brother for his next fight.

Reports since the fight in Australia have suggested that Cole Miller didn’t actually ask for the fight with Siler, but that’s not what he heard when the fight was offered to him.

“From what my manager told me, the UFC called him saying that Cole called the UFC right after my fight with Clopton ended begging for the fight,” Siler told MMAWeekly Radio. “Cole says otherwise. Either way, the match-up was made, didn’t matter to me. As long as we got the fight done and I got the win, it doesn’t matter to me.”

After getting to Australia, Siler locked eyes with Miller at the official weigh-ins where more than a few words were exchanged and the fighters had to be separated.

What exactly was said in those tense moments?

“He just stepped in my face and started rambling about me being disrespectful for bringing my fiancé to Australia, and saying I wasn’t taking the fight serious, and I was just trying to ask him what kind of excuse he was going to come up with when I beat him, or if he has food poisoning too, or what’s going to be his excuse,” Siler revealed.

24 hours later, Siler met the other Miller brother in the Octagon and proceeded to pull off another unlikely upset winning a unanimous decision.

Siler gives credit to his coaches for the win, stating that they broke Miller’s style down perfectly and gave him the right tools to walk away victorious.

“Going into the fight, we knew Cole liked being the bully and he hates being bullied. If you let him get in your face like Ross Pearson did, Cole’s going to do awesome. If you back him up, that’s when he’s weak, that’s when he’s the weakest. We wanted to keep it that way,” Siler said.

“I realized I needed to move forward the whole time if I wanted to win that fight.”

Following the win, much like what happened after the fight with Micah Miller, Siler started hearing the excuses. Some were saying that Miller’s first cut to 145 pounds was too much and it flawed his performance.

It didn’t bother Siler though because he is used to being the underdog, the guy who’s not supposed to win, but somehow finds a way to prove the naysayers wrong.

“People always have an excuse why I win a fight, and I’ll always be the underdog and that really doesn’t bother me at all. I like playing that role. It actually makes me laugh, people don’t give me the credit I deserve,” said Siler.

Unless there is another Miller brother waiting in the wings, Siler hopes his family feud is over. He actually shared a plane back to the United States with Cole, and while their conversations were brief, it seems the rivalry has been put to bed.

“For the most part, I think the bad blood’s squashed. I don’t think there’s any bad feelings,” said Siler. “I don’t have any bad feelings towards him at all. If he has bad feelings towards me still, I’m sorry, but for the most part, he seemed to be okay with me.”

Now that he’s 2-0 in the UFC, Steven Siler is okay if you keep doubting him, and he’s ready to prove his worth against whatever opponent the UFC sees fit for him to face.

His only request… please don’t let them have a brother waiting behind a curtain to throw out another challenge.

“I sure hope not,” Siler said with a laugh about facing another family of fighters. “I’d like to move on to single people only. I like to avoid the drama.”

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