First off, I need to thank Twitter for allowing this meeting to happen. If your on Twitter, then you already know how cool it can be to interact with celebrities and athletes. You can also follow me @Dragn73 if you'd like. If your not on Twitter then shame on you, it's alot of fun and can be addicting. Ok, enough of the shameless plug.
While I was waiting for Randy to leave his signing booth, I checked Twitter as I always do and noticed that Brandon had tweeted that he would be at Con, the times he would be there, and the booth. Awesome, so I headed down to say hi...I mean how many of these folks at Comic Con would not only know who Brandon Vera was, but also have checked Twitter at that exact same moment to get his location? The answer to that is about 7. There were not very many people in line to meet him, but whenever any type of crowd stops walking at Con, it inevitably makes alot of others stop to see who everyone is looking at. Turns out he was there helping out a buddy of his who writes his own comic and is currently using Brandon as a character reference.
While waiting, I was thinking about what I would ask him. I had so many fight related questions that are different from the general "your such a badass in the cage" comments that I imagine these guys hear so often, that I wanted to maximize my chance. Turns out, we just talked, like we had known each other for years, that's how down to Earth he is...it was much cooler than any of the questions I had intended. The one common thought that all MMA fighters seem to have aside from winning, is putting on a good fight, win or lose, and being entertaining for the fans, so I opened with that. "You always put on exciting fights and are never a one dimensional fighter, my wife and I really enjoy your fights." I did it, I made it past the first barrier, where these guys always get into a script routine meeting so many people saying the same thing. So I continued, "you were mowing through the heavyweight division, and when you dropped down, we knew you would mow through that one too, but 205 may be the toughest division in the UFC. There are alot of really tough guys there which have given you some really tough fights. Just goes to show the level of competition the UFC really has." He relaxed a bit more, nodded, and then we chatted about some of those tough guys he has faced and when he will be fighting again. (Not soon enough as he was injured in his last fight with Jon "Bones" Jones.)
I then told him how he completed my UFC trifecta for the day, in which he then asked who else I met. When I told him Jens and Randy, his eyes got big, and he said " Really, Randy's here? Where?" I could appreciate his excitement and it was nice to see that even other fighters are fans of Randy too. "He just left, he was here for an Expendable signing a few minutes ago." I told him. I could see he was bummed, and told him this turned into a UFC Expo for me. He laughed and told me how awesome those expos were and that if I hadn't been to one, I really should go when I get a chance. "You know, those expos are great, but I have to admit, I was kind of a dick during the last one." he said. "How so?" I asked. "Well, it's great meeting real fans like yourself, but sometimes people don't understand that I'm a fan too. At the last expo, I took pictures and signed autographs for a long time, but then I wanted to meet some of these guys too." he smiled. "So I took my camera and started walking around, cause I wanted to get a picture with GSP, Machida, and Randy, you know? People were coming up to me asking me for pics, and I was like "nope, sorry gotta go." So I was kind of an ass, but at the same time, I got some cool pics." he laughed. "So I need to apologize to my fans for that, and hope they understand." "Well, Brandon, I accept your apology on behalf of your fans, I'd want to do that as well, at least your honest about it." Fortunately he could see the humor in my comment, and laughed.
And that was the wrap, others were waiting to talk with him, but it genuinely felt like we could just talk all day, at least until he found out that Rampage might be around anyway. It was a great few minutes with a really cool guy. I walked away an even bigger fan of "The Truth."
dude, you rock. i mean, you're like a celebrity to me now. even more than you already were. whoa. is there no limit to you?
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