Leben - The crippler: cage fighting and my life on the edge

The events, locales, and conversations in this book have been recreated from memory. In order to maintain their anonymity, in some instances names and identifying characteristics and details such as physical descriptions, occupations, and places of residence have been changed.

Copyright 2016 by Chris Leben and Daniel J. Patinkin

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

Skyhorse Publishing books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or .

Skyhorse and Skyhorse Publishing are registered trademarks of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation.

Visit our website at www.skyhorsepublishing.com.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Leben, Chris, 1980

The crippler: cage fighting and my life on the edge / by Chris Leben, with Daniel Patinkin.

pages cm

ISBN 978-1-63450-566-6 (hardcover: alk. paper)ISBN 978-1-5107-0135-9 (ebook) 1. Leben, Chris, 1980- 2. Mixed martial artsBiography. I. Title.

GV1102.7.M59L43 2016

796.8092dc23

[B]

2015029058

Cover design by Rain Saukas

Cover photo: AP Images

Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

PERSPECTIVE

S ome people think I am a hero; others think I am the anti-Christ. Some people consider me the biggest dumbfuck who ever put on pants; others consider me an insightful person with a worthwhile perspective on the world. Some view me as an important trailblazer in the history of the sport of mixed martial arts; still others view me as a loudmouth thug who gained notoriety by being in the right place at the right time and by behaving like a reckless nutcase.

Some portion of each of those viewpointsmaybe even all of them in their entiretyare true at the same time. I acknowledge both sides of my coin without shame and without hesitation. I am a man, and I am a monster. I walk on that curved line that divides the yin from the yang. I am Chris Leben. I am the Crippler. And, like it or not, I exist on this planet.

For over ten years, I was a notable fighter in the MMA universe. During that time, almost eight years of which were with the UFC, I compiled a record of 2211. Thats not, by far, the best record ever strung together by a mixed martial artist. However, I can say that, quite honestly, I squared off with some of the most skilled and dangerous hand-to-hand combatants to ever walk the face of earth. Some of them I bested, even knocked out. Others kicked the piss out of me. Thats the fight game, after all. Drive a car long enough, and youre gonna get in a wreck. Sooner or later, no matter how great you are, your number will come up. The fight will end with you on your back, or with plasma dripping from your face, or with your head hung in shame because you just didnt have what it takes that night. An MMA fighter must deal with this painful inevitability.

I think it is fair to say I was a very good fightermaybe even a great fighterat times. But I was never the best, no matter how hard I tried or how badly I wanted it. As a result, you may be wondering why you should give two shits about whats contained in the next couple hundred pages. When the shelves are stocked with biographies and autobiographies of athletes who truly stood head and shoulders above their furious competition, why should you take the precious time to read a whole book about a not-quite-championship-caliber fighter who has pissed off as many people as he has pleased? Why not clap this book shut and find the nearest Barnes & Noble that has Ronda Rouseys book or B. J. Penns book or Georges St-Pierres book in stock?

The simple answer is this: none of them are me. Regardless of my shortcomings (of which there are many), I can boldly and confidently claim that there has never been another human being who has experienced life quite the way I have. In a world where the vast majority of people eke out a living, get laid a few times, and then die, I have made it my mission to forge a path all my own. To collect the most extreme of experiences. To suck the hot, sticky marrow from the bones of our inexplicable existence. What you read here might disgust you, shock you, terrify you. Or it might amaze and excite you. Probably all of those things. But I think when you make it through to this books final words, you will agree with me that Ive done to this thing called life in an obscenely unique way.

When I first announced on Twitter that I was writing this book, one of my followers replied with a hilarious tweet:

I got drunk a lot. The end.

I laughed my ass off at that. The drunk a lot part is very true. Yet, this mockery demonstrates how little most people know about me aside from the parts of my public persona that have reached the surface. My goal in writing this book is to give my readers an inside look at my erratic life. I want you to share the ups and downs, the hard choices and celebrations, and the victories and failures of a multilayered, highly emotional, and flawed human being who had the guts (or maybe the idiocy) to pursue his dreams with reckless abandon. Because, at the end of the day, I think we all embody these shortcomings and challenges, although most people dont express them with the kind of madness that I have.

You will have a reaction to this book, one way or another. I guarantee that. And my hope is that after you put this book down (or throw it out, or burn it...), you will feel compelled to reflect on your own life and on the lives of others. I want it to force you to wrestle with issues of morality and fear and insanity and love that you have never had reason to wrestle. One word sums it up: perspective. I want this book to give my readers perspective theyve never had before. The human experience is an ocean of confusion and complexity, and I think that the best way to navigate is to get the broadest lay of the land you can. Youll have a better chance of reaching your desired destination if you have a 360-degree, high and low, backward and forward viewpoint than if you are just looking through a periscope. And, as you allow your gaze to sweep the terrain, sometimes youll witness a glorious sunset over majestic mountaintops. Other times youll get a close-up look at a festering pile of dogshit.

Now, a little something about the writing of this book. I did not personally put any of the words on the pages. My writer, Daniel Patinkin, did all of that. We met for the first time in early 2014 through my manager, a crazy little Persian-Swede named Bobby Cavian. The reason I gave Daniel 100 percent of the writing duties is pretty simple: I can barely write. In fact, I think that until my early twenties, I would have been classified as illiterate. So, of course, taking it upon myself to put all of my experiences and thoughts on paper was out of the question. Instead, over eighteen months, Daniel and I spent hours and hours togetherin person, on the phone, and over Skyperecounting the wild shitstorm that is my life. I think, in all, Daniel recorded something along the lines of forty hours of interviews for this book. In the process, I believe he grew to understand me almost as well as anyone.