Current UFC 135-pound champ Merab Dvalishvili has a lot left to prove. He makes a maiden defense of the gold in the UFC 311 co-mains on ESPN+ pay-per-view, on January 18, in Inglewood. However, Dvalishvili does not leave much to the imagination regarding wild stories/interactions. But accidentally sparring with Hollywood star Kevin James takes the cake on it!
Battling and/or taking cues from Hollywood notables – pish posh! Happens every other day in UFC/MMA circles. What makes it funnier is that in typical Merab Dvalishvili way, the ever-frenetic Georgian didn’t know it. Kevin James was visibly sparring with him via Chris Weidman’s ‘Won’t Back Down Radio’ show on SiriusXM. The bantamweight champ recently appeared in a UFC 311 pre-fight media sitdown on the ‘Verse Us with Eric Nicksick’ Podcast. ‘Machine’ explained his long folly.
So in Longo’s, …we were training night time. That moment 2018 I fought my second fight in the UFC and I got a bonus…I lost but I got a bonus. Chris Weidman made a group and texted saying ‘Hey guys train in the morning our pro groups’…and [didn’t know who]…there is some little bit fat guy…and I got this guy Kevin James; he looked familiar, but I had no idea [who he was]…So we’re in the cage sparring and he’s kind of throwing heavy, hard [shots] and then like, I see he is trying
Merab Dvalishvili via ‘Verse Us with Eric Nicksick’ Podcast (@VSUSPod)
No back then Dvalishvili did not have his UFC 311 pre-fight woes. But the then-contender still had steam to blow off before putting together a 10-fight winning streak (8 at the time) for a crack at the title. He never fought not charged up and the discourse with the Hollywood A-lister turned out the same!
That is a dangerous prospect against a guy always ready to throw down with all and sundry! Leave to mean ‘Merab’ to square up not knowingly. He did however see that James was trying to push it and trying to throw heavy slugs. He estimated that this was some former wrestler trying to amp up his game. So he didn’t even dial down the intensity on it! The fighter remembers going hard until Weidman pulled him aside and reprimanded him. James himself has his version of the story too.
Kevin James details scary sparring session with Merab Dvalishvili
Now there are those like Michael Jai White who are more mainstream MMA practitioners and have gone several rounds with top fighters. He even pitches in on a UFC card or two. There’s Hollywood A-lister and 10-time world champion Dwayne Johnson who has been a big thing in WWE and has started MMA too. Kevin James was never infamous as such a figure.
But Paul Blart the mall cop fame and Doug Heffernan from The King of Queens, James was quite the prizefighting enthusiast. As Merab Dvalishvili rightly vibed, James was a collegiate heavyweight wrestler. He even played an MMA part – in ‘Here Comes the Boom’, where he’s trying to save the music department and impress the one-and-only Salma Hayek. Spoiler alert: he does!
Did the sparring rounds with then number three-ranked UFC bantamweight contender Merab Dvalishvili help the discourse? It was ‘scary’ for James even years later – to say the least.
I tag in, and I go to him, and Merab comes at me. I go, ‘Hey man, let’s go.’ And I guess I look like a big, fat heavyweight or something, I didn’t know what it was. But this guy turns it on, and he doesn’t know I’m an actor. He’s the only guy that didn’t know I’m an actor! …So he starts lighting me up like a Christmas tree. He starts tagging me, and I was freaking out. I had head gear on, too
Kevin James on ‘Won’t Back Down Radio’ show on SiriusXM (📽️’Won’t Back Down Radio’ w/ @chrisweidman)
“This guy turns it on and he doesn’t know I’m an actor!”@KevinJames details a sparring session with ‘The Machine’ @MerabDvalishvil 🤣
📽️’Won’t Back Down Radio’ w/ @chrisweidman pic.twitter.com/i5tvuIQpB8
— MMA on SiriusXM (@MMAonSiriusXM) February 21, 2023
The sparring session was in 2018, six years after ‘Here Comes the Boom’. But the Georgian said James still looked in decent shape back then and it was clear he was there for proper training. Prone to revert to his wild side, facing Dvalishvili was scary, said James. The fighter went full force, trying to knock out a heavyweight-looking guy! Guess this goes to the ‘pros’ list as to why one should watch a lot of Tele growing up.
Related: Merab Dvalishvili wants to get on the Alex Pereira schedule, targets 3 title defenses in 3 months
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