Gregor Gillespie's path from wrestling, to rehab, to MMA redemption at ROC 50

Gregor Gillespie

Gregor Gillespie remembers a teammate’s almost flippant piece of encouragement one day in 2012 as he walked around with an IV pump in his backpack.

“You’re going to be back,” the teammate told him, as if he had even gotten there in the first place.

The truth was, he hadn’t fought yet. It was just that year that he had decided he was going to fight.

“That’s easy to say when you’re 10-1,” Gillespie (3-0), who tonight faces Justin Stewart (0-0) at Ring of Combat 50, told MMAjunkie. “When you’re 0-0, and you’re 26 years old, that’s tough.”

ROC 50 takes place at Tropicana Casino and Resort in Atlantic City, N.J. The event streams live via online pay-per-view.

After college, Gillespie told his friends he would never, ever compete in MMA. This was despite his wrestling pedigree at Edinboro University, a Division I school where he once won an NCAA title. Others, such as longtime UFC vet Josh Koscheck, found MMA success after graduating.

When he was in school, Gillespie ran in the same competitive circles as now-UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones. They weren’t great friends or anything, but he knew a lot of people who would go on to become famous for fighting. By the time his four years were up, however, he was done with wrestling.

Gillespie was tired of everything that came along with competing. It was like a prison sentence – the weight-cutting, working out, and sacrificing of fun. He wanted to have more of the latter. He liked to drink.

So he did that, and other things, which would “keep me up all night.”

“I couldn’t get out of my own way,” he remembers. “I was going down a path that really only led to one place. I got caught up in it, and it’s not an easy battle to win.”

One night, he was working on his Subaru XTI in the garage of his apartment building. It was a prized possession in a place he said he had turned into “a nightmare.” His electricity was about to be shut off, and he was to be evicted the next day. His fiancee had left him, and he was broke. But he loved his car.

Lying on his back, he said a wave of disgust passed over him. He called his wrestling coach, who told him to go to rehab.

He had taken an evaluation at a facility once before when his fiancee first threatened to leave. He called the facility and asked if they still had his information and had a place to stay. The next day, he drove himself in.

Gillespie spent a summer there in rehab. It was 2010. He began wrestling again. Two years out of college, he wrestled at the U.S. Open. He won a world team trial in Iowa and contemplated a run at the 2012 Summer Olympics.

“I was ranked in the top eight,” he said. “But if you go to the worlds or the Olympics, there’s Jordan Burroughs. He’s the best guy in the world at any weight. He’s unbelievable. To beat him in a neutral match – freestyle is all on your feet, and my best position is top, so that’s a tough one.”

Gillespie found MMA after he moved to Long Island, N.Y. He hooked up with a crew of tough up-and-comers who would later fight in the UFC: Ryan LaFlare, Dennis Bermudez, Chris Wade and others.

Right away, he sensed he was on the right path.

“I just knew that I was holding my own, if not winning the rounds,” he said. “Not against Ryan LaFlare, but the other guys who were my size. I knew it was going to be alright.”

One day, three weeks from his first pro fight, he was sparring with LaFlare when he took a high kick to the arm. It broke his ulna. With the first surgery, he had plates and screws inserted into the bone. The second, he had a PICC line put in his arm; the bone had become infected with MRSA.

The line stayed in his arm for nine weeks. He had to carry around the IV pump. He couldn’t work out.

Eventually, though, he got better. In January 2014, he had his first pro fight. As it turned out, his intuition was correct: He stopped his opponent via TKO inside two minutes. He submitted his next two inside a round.

Next, Gillespie, now a lightweight, faces Stewart. According to a prominent MMA database, it appears Stewart is in vastly over his head, especially when Gillespie’s collegiate wrestling credentials are taken into account.

It took Gillespie a while to get to the point where he could be considered an up-and-comer. It’s hard to say whether or not it’s all been for the best. But he is back, and he is moving forward, just like his teammate told him he would.

“To say that someone starts late, what if someone without a wrestling background started fighting at 20, and it takes them six years to come close to the wrestling ability of a decent guy,” he said. “I don’t know (whether I started too late). I’d like to think I’m ahead of the eight ball as far as that is concerned. I definitely wasn’t mature enough to do anything like I’m doing now, four five years ago.”