Henderson on MMA Start: ‘I Just Needed the Money’

Former two-division Pride Fighting Championships titleholder and current Strikeforce light heavyweight champion Dan Henderson (Pictured) discussed his start in mixed martial arts back in 1997 during a pre-fight teleconference for Strikeforce/M-1 Global “Fedor vs. Henderson” on Saturday at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, Ill. There, he will face Russian great Fedor Emelianenko in a 220-pound catchweight main event:

“I’d seen it on TV and thought maybe I’d like to do that, but I don’t know. I don’t want to fight the big 300-pounders that were in there back then, or 400-pounders. MMA wasn’t around when I was a kid. It was after two Olympic teams that I decided to give it a try. I was just a wrestler and real focused on trying to make Olympic teams. I had a call to maybe get an MMA fight, and two weeks later, I fought. I just needed the money. I didn’t give a whole lot of thought to whether it would be fun or not. I just thought I’d try it. I was just a wrestler at that point.”