Former UFC middleweight champion Robert Whittaker has elaborated on the mouth injury he sustained in his October defeat to Khamzat Chimaev.
Whittaker tapped to a face crank applied by the undefeated 185-pound contender Chimaev in the UFC 308 co-main event of the fight league’s latest event in Abu Dhabi — with subsequent images posted online revealed that Whittaker had sustained what appeared to be significant damage to his bottom teeth due to the pressure applied by the Chechen fighter.
And speaking on the MMArcade podcast this week, Whittaker said that his bottom teeth had been a prolonged issue he was dealing with — and paid tribute to Chimaev for becoming just the second fighter in his 34-fight career to defeat him by submission.
“I’ve had missing teeth for 10 years plus. So I’ve always been kind of shot because they’re not stable. They’re not a full circuit, they’re like half,” the ex-champ said, as noted by MMA Fighting. “Over the years, trauma whatever, I don’t know. It was something that needed to be addressed by every dentist was always ‘Try to keep your real teeth. Keep your real teeth.’ I should’ve got rid of them years ago.
“They got pushed in a little bit when I fought Dricus,” he added of his July 2023 loss to current champion Dricus du Plessis.
“I had to address that, they had to be pushed back, I had a cast in there, let them settle, yada yada yada, move on. Then when I fought Ikram [Aliskerov], I had all these infections. I had to get four root canals. And I think the teeth had just had it. I think they had just had enough. Enough is enough. I don’t think there was anything holding the teeth there anymore.
“But anyway, his forearm goes straight across the bottom teeth and they move straight away. Then the squeeze after it, they were gone. They just went straight back in. Everyone and their friend saw the photos.
“My teeth just went straight in and I couldn’t fight out of it. I could feel my teeth in the middle of my mouth. I was done. And hats off to Chimaev. Guy had a plan, went in there, executed it for whatever reason, got the W.”
And now that he has had the issue addressed, Whittaker says that he can’t help but feel gratitude to Chimaev.
“You know what? I’ll go as far as to say, Chimaev did me a favour,” Whittaker said. “He got rid of the teeth.
“The fear of hurting my bottom teeth, of them moving — they’ve always been crap. I haven’t been able to bite down on like an apple since I was 19. They’ve always been bad. I should’ve dealt with them.
“They’re just gone. I don’t need them. My life is better without them. Fun fact though, when they took them out they found a massive cyst in my jaw. Apparently they think that might have been where the infections were coming from with the teeth. So everything happens for a reason.”
