Brandon Girtz details shoulder injury after loss to Michael Chandler
By Amy Kaplan
Brandon Girtz spoke to FanSided about his loss to Michael Chandler at Bellator 197 and the shoulder injury that could have him sidelined.
Bellator MMA lightweight Brandon Girtz reveales he suffered a shoulder injury during his fight with Michael Chandler at Bellator 197 Friday but it isn’t the physical wounds he’s having to heal.
“I’m doing alright man,” Girtz told James Lynch of FanSided on Tuesday. “I’m doing a little better. There’s more of a mental side that I feel is harder to recover from.”
Chandler defeated Girtz via a first-round submission in the night’s main event but not before the Denver native injured his shoulder.
“I was feeling great out there,” he said. “In that fight I was getting excited in there cuz I felt like I had it. I rocked him once or twice in there and I could see it — he didn’t know what to do with me o the feet.”
It was then Chandler, an accomplished wrestler, picked up Girtz and slammed him to the mat causing his shoulder to separate.
“When I wizard-ed out of it I posted my hand, a move I have done a million times in wrestling, I posted my arm and I felt my arm give. This is all happening in seconds.”
He says that when he went to stand up, he could not feel his arm. He says he thought he could wait out the choke, but it wasn’t possible.
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The prognosis is still up in the air as he hasn’t gotten enough answers as to how long he will be out yet.
“I’ll go in tomorrow and they’ll tell me exactly what I gotta do about it.”
Chandler broke Bellator’s win (14) and stoppage (11) record with the defeat of Girtz. This is the first defeat of Girtz who bounced back from a three-fight losing streak when he defeated Luka Jelcic via a first-round knockout in Dec.