by Flip English
On October 21st Kevin Ross will be fighting the dangerous Sakkedao Petchpayathai, the last man to beat his previous opponent, Muay Thai legend Saenchai SinbiMuayThai. No doubt this fight will be another grinder for Ross, a gritty test for his rugged reputation. Anytime a fighter is coming off a loss there is that added pressure to win the next one to keep the career afloat, but if your last fight was with Saenchai and your next bout with Sakkedao, I can imagine how this could be for Ross like a tornado dropping him on the path of torrential typhoon, or exiting a burning building only to enter a raging street riot outside. But before Ross crosses the Green Zone and into combat again, he is still in the eye of the hurricane, still in the calm between the old storm that was Saenchai and the new struggle that will be Sakkedao. So how is he doing? Is this training period enough time to repair the damages and prepare retaliation for a loss? We will see. Two weeks before his next performance at the M-One event at the Nokia Club in Los Angeles, Kevin grants MuayThaiAuthority.com an interview where he and I go for a dozen rounds of questioning.
Being it was a high-profile interview, the pressure to exude professionalism was more pronounced than usual as I traded thoughts with Muay Thai Authority’s 2010 North American Muay Thai Fighter of the Year, but with Kevin addressing me as ‘brotha,’ a lot of anxiety was immediately alleviated during the greet. It also helped that he contributes pieces to the website and is familiar with my role as a writer, so I wasn’t concerned much of his feedback being too tight. If it was actually a real sparring session and we exchanged blows rather than words, I predicted not having to chase Ross around so much to get my shots off. I lead with a question wanting to hear the cool story of how he got his stage name which begins round one.
First of all, your moniker, "The Soul Assassin," did you make that up yourself or was it given? And is there any special meaning behind it? It was given to me after I had my first pro fight, which was in Guadalajara, Mexico. I fought a guy named Juan Carlos Guadarrama, he had a record of about 31-1-1 and had just previously lost his first fight, I got the call on about two weeks notice to fight him, of course I said yes. I can only assume they had called me up in order to help him get his confidence back. We had a real war, he split the inside of my mouth open so badly in the 1st round, it was about two inches long and I only had about a paper thin layer of skin keeping it from completely ripping through to the outside. The entire fight I was swallowing mouthfuls of blood. I cut him with an elbow in the second, one of the bloodiest fights I have ever been in, other than my fight with Sitisak. He gave me everything he had and I just kept moving forward, as usual. Finally in the 4th he went down and couldn’t take it anymore, the fight was over. Afterwards a guy in the crowd came up to me saying congrats and said “you never stop going after him, it’s like you took his soul. They should call you the soul assassin”, and that’s where it came from. It just stuck with me after that because of the way I fight.
Talk about a baptism by blood. I had forgotten who or where it was that I heard or read it from, but hearing it again straight from Kevin told me why I was so curious of relearning the story again. It’s so definitive of how he is as a fighter. When a man’s first fight is intended to make him a sacrifice and he flips the script on everyone and hands his seasoned foe an upset, well it speaks something about that man: that Kevin Ross is to never be underestimated. Actually, with this story in mind, now I rethink this upcoming fight with the Lumpinee Stadium Champion and Kevin Ross. I would not be surprised if the assassin gets another soul in dramatic fashion. History has shown that Ross has the mettle to make the most of any mayhem thrown his way. So maybe he’ll just have a boat built before that typhoon comes, or finds riot gear and guns after escaping the blazing building.
Round two: There's a really good YouTube video highlighting your past fights (by Scarfacelv2). What I like about it is how it shows you taking a beating and losing and then you coming back much stronger and overwhelming your rivals. Your last fight with Saenchai resulted in a majority decision loss. I'm sure since then you are just itching to avenge it. That said, what's your mentality going into this fight with Petchpayathai? Are you expecting the type of challenge that Saenchai had posed or are you feeling a lot more confident facing Sakkedao? Thanks, James Blair put that together for me after me giving him about three pages of notes on how exactly I wanted it done hahahaha. All you ever see are people’s highlights so of course they look good. But I find it important to show all the aspects of fighting. I’m not really itching for a quick rematch with Saenchai. I mean if it comes up then great but if not I don’t really care. I’d prefer to fight people that want to stand toe to toe and fight, I hate having to chase people around hahaha. That’s why I think Liam (Harrison) and I would be a great match up, an Arturo Gatti v Ward style Thai fight. As for this fight, there’s new challenges every time you get in there, even if you are fighting the same person again. No matter how much footage you’ve seen on someone or how much you may think you know how they are going to fight, you never really know what’s going to happen until you are in there. I expect the best from my opponents every time I’m in the ring and I train myself accordingly. Every fight I try and train harder and smarter than the time before. I work on my weaknesses and try to increase my strengths. Sagetdao is an extremely experienced talented fighter who I am sure is going to bring me his best. As always I’m killing myself everyday in the gym in order to give my best in the fight. As I said you never know what to expect when you’re in there but Saketdao has a completely different style then Saenchai so I expect a completely different kind of fight.
Because of his sharp eye for reality, Ross sees enough heart in Sakkedao’s game to know that he is also not one to be underestimated, which is why the showcase of respect with consistent camp conditioning, because he is conscious of Sakkedao’s lethality too. What this reveals is an interesting character note. Ross is very much content on focusing on the future as the loss to Saenchai does not seem to bother him to the point that it rents space in his head. It’s a winner’s mentality to be able to put all emotions aside to concentrate on relevant tasks, and right now the priority for Ross is the defeat of Sakkedao. As for the Harrison proposition, I agree it would be an exciting match to watch. I saw Liam perform at The Warrior’s Cup event in New Jersey last July and the leg kicks he used that night as an ax to chop down his opponent were serious. My ringside view was close enough to see the lumpy red tender thighs that Liam’s leg kicks had produced. If they ever do fight, Ross should obviously avoid excessive connections from Liam’s kicks. And for Liam’s sake, if he doesn’t want to get clobbered, then I’d advise to not run from Ross in the ring, but instead meet him head on. Doing so only heats his aggression.
Next round: You had an epic rematch with Kang En, and the bout you had with Saenchai delivered an exciting showdown where you managed to keep him from executing some of his signature trick-shots. Many fans think a Part 2 is in order in the future. Do you want that fight soon? Do you feel ready for it now or do you want to broaden your experience some more before facing him again? As I mentioned earlier I would be open for it but it isn’t something that’s on my mind or anything. If it does happen I feel that it should be more down the road. I like when some time passes in between rematches that way you are seeing two different fighters in there as opposed to the same thing again.
Ross has a good point that was hard to leave behind. Kevin lives to make exciting fights happen in the ring, but he knows that both fighters have to be into the contest or else the magic doesn’t happen. I have seen hyped fights that had a lot of potential on paper, but then when it manifested in the ring it turned out to be a lemon. Sometimes for it to work the two styles need to be complementary. Sometimes there has to be a real rivalry, a stronger motivation fueled by real emotions. I was trying too hard to stimulate a campaign for a rematch that I ended up overlooking the truth. Saenchai and Ross have too much respect for each other for a rematch to happen soon. It will be one of those special things fans will have to wait for.
Moving forward to the fight with Ross and Sakkedao, the buzz around it is similar to the one Kevin had with Saenchai. Sakkedao’s style might be different from Saenchai’s but it doesn’t make him less dangerous. Sakkedao is the last Nak Muay to defeat Saenchai and the two are in a stalemate in their saga with both fighters even at two wins and two losses versus each other. This next fight may be the second of two rough slices in a tough sandwich of fighters to digest, but Kevin is giving no signs of a choker as he trains his appetite to bite big for the Sakkedao fight. Next I hit Kevin with a combo of questions to try and open him up about strategies.
What aspect of your game did you focus on as you trained for Sakkedao? Was it more about defense, offense, or did you just work on everything? I pretty much always work on everything regardless of who my next opponent may be. There might be a few things that I focus on a little more depending on who it is but I always try and focus more on what I am going to do as opposed to thinking too much about what they might do.
What part of Sakkedao's game do you think brings the biggest threat against yours, and what part of yours do you think you can exploit over Sakkedao? Like most Thai’s he’s real good at kicks and clinching, nothing I haven’t seen or dealt with before. He’s lefty which can cause some people problems but having just come off my fight with Saenchai I am used to that look. As for me I always feel I can push the pace and outbox anyone I’m in there with. I need to mix it up and add a few more kicks and knees here as in my fight with Saenchai I got too side tracked on only boxing. He also hasn’t fought much outside of Thailand so he is used to the style and tempo that most Thai’s fight with.
It sounds like Ross’ strategy for victory relies in the differences of styles, trying to outsmart Sakkedao by making him adjust to a more amped-up tempo he does not typically see. My guess is to expect Ross being the aggressor and favoring upper body offenses and swinging his legs much more than he did in his last match. But as for which of his techniques are his favorite tools in the ring? Aside from elbows I couldn’t exactly figure out much. He’s the kind who treats all his anatomical weapons with equal affection: By the way, do you have a particular strike that you love to land? Is it the roundhouse elbow, the flying knee, the cartwheel head-kick? Something else? Yea I love all those but I really just love anything that is exciting to watch, ones that you don’t see most fighters throw. Of course I love using elbows but I constantly get yelled at for getting into elbow wars hahahahaha.
I guess as long as it can bruise and draw blood then he will love to use it, and fighters in the game will fear him for loving to use it. But if the feeling of fear isn’t what people react with, then the other response would be its relative: respect. Muay Thai in America came a long way from where it started. From what I understand, usually the way it was back in the day, whenever somebody brought up an American in a Muay Thai conversation it was like trying to play pesos against dollars. A decade or so ago the stock value of American Nak Muays at the Muay Thai market would’ve had Bear numbers. The exchange of respect was embarrassing. We were just not given the same amount of it back then than we do now, but that perception has changed over the years and with the new players involved in the game. A big part to this conversion of opinions can be credited to fighters like Ross. I was very curious to know his reflections on this, on how we went from getting little respect to having someone like Saenchai acknowledging emerging talents from our part of the world. We clinch over this topic for a few rounds.
Muay Thai in America keeps growing and growing. How do you feel about its progress? Are there some things you see that could propel it faster? In your opinion, what areas need tweaking for it to really blow up and enter the mainstream? Or are you content about it being a relatively underground sport like a certain fraction of Muay Thai fans? It’s one of those things where it has its good and bad points. Unfortunately, for the most part, the more mainstream something gets the more watered down it gets. Of course I want the sport to get big so that people are exposed to what I feel is the most exciting fighting there is and so the shows get bigger and better and hopefully one day fighters are actually able to make a living off of this sport that takes so much sacrifice. But at the same time I look at MMA and see how mainstream it is and see how everyone and their mother trains ‘UFC’ and how they have just flooded the market with it. I enjoy that people that are involved in Mauy Thai are in it for the love of the sport as opposed for the fame and fortune. I definitely want to see the sport keep it’s purity as it grows. The last thing I want to see is it become some watered down Americanized kickboxing. The biggest thing we need in order for its growth is exposure, mainly on television. It’s hard to get sponsors and money for something that only a few thousand people are going to see. It has really been growing over the past few years and I hope it continues to move forward like this.
Personally, what I love about Muay Thai is that it's purely a striking sport and action-orientated, unlike the grappling and BJJ aspects of MMA that sometimes slows the pace of its matches. How about you, what keeps you loyal to Muay Thai? What has been that resistance factor that has kept you from crossing over to the more lucrative sport of MMA or boxing? Well there was a time that I seriously thought about switching over. I guess the biggest thing that kept me from doing it was in knowing that for me it would have to be all or nothing. If I was going to switch then I wanted to be the best and to me that means giving everything that I have to the sport, which would mean I would not compete in Muay Thai anymore. That and the fact that I just love Muay Thai so much. I’ve had MMA and boxing fights and neither could even come close to the feeling I get in a Muay Thai fight. I felt like I just got done in a sparring session or something. There was no rush, no thrill. There’s just something about Muay Thai, its purity, its violence and beauty, nothing can compare.
How do you feel about the talent pool in American Muay Thai? What names out there currently impress you? There’s a few names coming up now that can definitely hang and win on the world class stage. Guys like Joe Schilling, Ky Hollenbeck, Romie Adanza, Michael Mananquil and Chaz Mulkey have proved they can represent America at the top level. And there’s a lot of guys coming up it’s just a matter of them getting the experience and having the right opportunities and hopefully our sport will continue to grow here in America and we can prove to the rest of the world that we belong.
You’ve expressed interest in wanting to fight Fabio Pinca (France) and Liam Harrison (Great Britain). These two fighters are non-American. Is that on purpose? I mean, are you trying to prove something about the quality of American Nak Muays by challenging international ones? I’m just looking at the guys who are at the top of this sport right now as well as guys who I think would make for exciting fights. At this point right now there are only a handful of guys here in America that can even compete at the top and most of us are in different weight classes. I only want to fight the very best and there aren’t any Americans in my weight class who I look at as the best so I don’t really see the point in fighting them other than to stay active.
Being that you are the most recognizable Nak Muay from America, basically its poster-boy, do you feel added pressure to represent? Does it help you at all in your drive to be one of the best in the international scene? I am extremely grateful to be where I am at today in this sport and am flattered that there are people who look at me as that. But no I don’t feel any added pressure. I have given everything I’ve had to this sport from day one. Every time I get in the ring I give it all that I have. Every time I train I give it all that I have and more. I’ve always wanted to be the best that I can possibly be. I never could have dreamt that it would end up where it is today. I just take it one day at a time and give it all that I have and we’ll just see where this ends up.
There’s a good chance it could possibly end up that Kevin Ross will become the American Icon for the sport of Muay Thai, but that type of future, as Ross suggests, depends on what we do each day of our lives. Right now Ross spends his current days planning his dispatch of Petchpayathai, practicing the moves he wants to execute in the ring with Sakkedao, the ones that can draw blood and get the respect, the ones beautiful enough to add to his video portfolio of punishments to immortalize his career.
Last question: You love Muay Thai. It's tatted on your fingers. As a fan and fighter of the sport, and excluding yourself, what is the fight you would absolutely love to see within the next year? Recently Kem Sitsongpeenong has called out Buakaw, I would love to see that go down or a fight between Pinca and Harrison, but I’m biased as they are in my weight class. But more than anything I want to see Muay Thai here in America continue to grow and I’m going to be doing everything I can on my part to see that happen.
On October 21st Kevin Ross will continue to make good on his promise as he and Team USA pushes its international growth against the warriors of Thailand. The event is another opportunity for the sport’s expansion in America and a reality check to see where everyone’s game is at. For Ross it is just another fight to test the might of his will, to experience a new fighter’s style and stretch the dynamics of his skills. It will be interesting to see if Ross demonstrates any upgrades in his techniques, what new improvements the soul collector has gained from camp, and if he will have a different angle to try out against his latest assassination assignment.
After the interview I read repeatedly the answers that Ross had given. I softly recite them methodically to myself as if his words were mine, trying to infiltrate his mind, seeing what more I could find. I reverse-engineer his sentences and ask what would compel a man to say this or that, trying to get a deeper insight into his personality. I am an actor attempting to get into someone’s shoes, a detective trying to match the evidence to the correct suspect. In the end I gamble on my best thought and tell myself what I know about Kevin Ross as a whole, both as the fighter and the man. Realistically, it’s somewhere between minimal and barely nothing, but it’s a start. The shoes didn’t fit and I still have a suspect on the loose.
It goes back to what we heard as children, about not judging someone by what others say, and figuring your own opinion through personal interaction with that person. Now I can work Google’s search engine all day and watch fight footages, hear interviews, and read articles about him, but like Ross had mentioned before, I can do all that but I still won’t have a solid understanding of how someone is until I’m in the fray with him in the ring. Like in fighting, it may take at least a trilogy for two fighters to get a sense of each other’s style, but once a good grip is established between them, that’s when to expect the real fireworks to begin.
But I’m no Nak Muay and will never get first-person knowledge from a real throw down with Ross. I will have to go on the face-value of his words and not force myself to go deeper than that surface. What I discovered from the interview is who he is now at this particular moment in time, but it doesn’t dictate who the Ross of the past was and who the Kevin of the future will be, and I think that is the safest thing I can bet on about him. The reason he’s come up so far in his career is because of adaptability. He is a true survivalist. He’s constantly in motion in his mind, evolving silently beneath the surface where it’s hard to spot the progress, but you can notice the little enhancements by watching a video catalog of his works. You can see that he can shift a strategy in between rounds if the one before was not effective, like when he worked with Kang En on their rematch.
I pitched Ross twelve rounds and he ate them easily. It was a decent test of how flexible his boundaries were. Mentally he is vigorously focused on his upcoming set with Sakkedao, and those rounds have precedence over mine, as they should. So I gave my meeting with Ross a unanimous vote in his favor. His mind is as strong as his heart. I went easy with my questions and kept it about his profession, but I won’t come the same way if a rematch is meant down the road. If anything it was a learning experience and he had taught me something. Next time I’ll be more ambitious, more aggressive. Next time I’ll be going harder. Next time my twelve rounds will be hollow-pointed. Next time I’ll be going for his soul.
Being it was a high-profile interview, the pressure to exude professionalism was more pronounced than usual as I traded thoughts with Muay Thai Authority’s 2010 North American Muay Thai Fighter of the Year, but with Kevin addressing me as ‘brotha,’ a lot of anxiety was immediately alleviated during the greet. It also helped that he contributes pieces to the website and is familiar with my role as a writer, so I wasn’t concerned much of his feedback being too tight. If it was actually a real sparring session and we exchanged blows rather than words, I predicted not having to chase Ross around so much to get my shots off. I lead with a question wanting to hear the cool story of how he got his stage name which begins round one.
First of all, your moniker, "The Soul Assassin," did you make that up yourself or was it given? And is there any special meaning behind it? It was given to me after I had my first pro fight, which was in Guadalajara, Mexico. I fought a guy named Juan Carlos Guadarrama, he had a record of about 31-1-1 and had just previously lost his first fight, I got the call on about two weeks notice to fight him, of course I said yes. I can only assume they had called me up in order to help him get his confidence back. We had a real war, he split the inside of my mouth open so badly in the 1st round, it was about two inches long and I only had about a paper thin layer of skin keeping it from completely ripping through to the outside. The entire fight I was swallowing mouthfuls of blood. I cut him with an elbow in the second, one of the bloodiest fights I have ever been in, other than my fight with Sitisak. He gave me everything he had and I just kept moving forward, as usual. Finally in the 4th he went down and couldn’t take it anymore, the fight was over. Afterwards a guy in the crowd came up to me saying congrats and said “you never stop going after him, it’s like you took his soul. They should call you the soul assassin”, and that’s where it came from. It just stuck with me after that because of the way I fight.
Talk about a baptism by blood. I had forgotten who or where it was that I heard or read it from, but hearing it again straight from Kevin told me why I was so curious of relearning the story again. It’s so definitive of how he is as a fighter. When a man’s first fight is intended to make him a sacrifice and he flips the script on everyone and hands his seasoned foe an upset, well it speaks something about that man: that Kevin Ross is to never be underestimated. Actually, with this story in mind, now I rethink this upcoming fight with the Lumpinee Stadium Champion and Kevin Ross. I would not be surprised if the assassin gets another soul in dramatic fashion. History has shown that Ross has the mettle to make the most of any mayhem thrown his way. So maybe he’ll just have a boat built before that typhoon comes, or finds riot gear and guns after escaping the blazing building.
Round two: There's a really good YouTube video highlighting your past fights (by Scarfacelv2). What I like about it is how it shows you taking a beating and losing and then you coming back much stronger and overwhelming your rivals. Your last fight with Saenchai resulted in a majority decision loss. I'm sure since then you are just itching to avenge it. That said, what's your mentality going into this fight with Petchpayathai? Are you expecting the type of challenge that Saenchai had posed or are you feeling a lot more confident facing Sakkedao? Thanks, James Blair put that together for me after me giving him about three pages of notes on how exactly I wanted it done hahahaha. All you ever see are people’s highlights so of course they look good. But I find it important to show all the aspects of fighting. I’m not really itching for a quick rematch with Saenchai. I mean if it comes up then great but if not I don’t really care. I’d prefer to fight people that want to stand toe to toe and fight, I hate having to chase people around hahaha. That’s why I think Liam (Harrison) and I would be a great match up, an Arturo Gatti v Ward style Thai fight. As for this fight, there’s new challenges every time you get in there, even if you are fighting the same person again. No matter how much footage you’ve seen on someone or how much you may think you know how they are going to fight, you never really know what’s going to happen until you are in there. I expect the best from my opponents every time I’m in the ring and I train myself accordingly. Every fight I try and train harder and smarter than the time before. I work on my weaknesses and try to increase my strengths. Sagetdao is an extremely experienced talented fighter who I am sure is going to bring me his best. As always I’m killing myself everyday in the gym in order to give my best in the fight. As I said you never know what to expect when you’re in there but Saketdao has a completely different style then Saenchai so I expect a completely different kind of fight.
Because of his sharp eye for reality, Ross sees enough heart in Sakkedao’s game to know that he is also not one to be underestimated, which is why the showcase of respect with consistent camp conditioning, because he is conscious of Sakkedao’s lethality too. What this reveals is an interesting character note. Ross is very much content on focusing on the future as the loss to Saenchai does not seem to bother him to the point that it rents space in his head. It’s a winner’s mentality to be able to put all emotions aside to concentrate on relevant tasks, and right now the priority for Ross is the defeat of Sakkedao. As for the Harrison proposition, I agree it would be an exciting match to watch. I saw Liam perform at The Warrior’s Cup event in New Jersey last July and the leg kicks he used that night as an ax to chop down his opponent were serious. My ringside view was close enough to see the lumpy red tender thighs that Liam’s leg kicks had produced. If they ever do fight, Ross should obviously avoid excessive connections from Liam’s kicks. And for Liam’s sake, if he doesn’t want to get clobbered, then I’d advise to not run from Ross in the ring, but instead meet him head on. Doing so only heats his aggression.
Next round: You had an epic rematch with Kang En, and the bout you had with Saenchai delivered an exciting showdown where you managed to keep him from executing some of his signature trick-shots. Many fans think a Part 2 is in order in the future. Do you want that fight soon? Do you feel ready for it now or do you want to broaden your experience some more before facing him again? As I mentioned earlier I would be open for it but it isn’t something that’s on my mind or anything. If it does happen I feel that it should be more down the road. I like when some time passes in between rematches that way you are seeing two different fighters in there as opposed to the same thing again.
Ross has a good point that was hard to leave behind. Kevin lives to make exciting fights happen in the ring, but he knows that both fighters have to be into the contest or else the magic doesn’t happen. I have seen hyped fights that had a lot of potential on paper, but then when it manifested in the ring it turned out to be a lemon. Sometimes for it to work the two styles need to be complementary. Sometimes there has to be a real rivalry, a stronger motivation fueled by real emotions. I was trying too hard to stimulate a campaign for a rematch that I ended up overlooking the truth. Saenchai and Ross have too much respect for each other for a rematch to happen soon. It will be one of those special things fans will have to wait for.
Moving forward to the fight with Ross and Sakkedao, the buzz around it is similar to the one Kevin had with Saenchai. Sakkedao’s style might be different from Saenchai’s but it doesn’t make him less dangerous. Sakkedao is the last Nak Muay to defeat Saenchai and the two are in a stalemate in their saga with both fighters even at two wins and two losses versus each other. This next fight may be the second of two rough slices in a tough sandwich of fighters to digest, but Kevin is giving no signs of a choker as he trains his appetite to bite big for the Sakkedao fight. Next I hit Kevin with a combo of questions to try and open him up about strategies.
What aspect of your game did you focus on as you trained for Sakkedao? Was it more about defense, offense, or did you just work on everything? I pretty much always work on everything regardless of who my next opponent may be. There might be a few things that I focus on a little more depending on who it is but I always try and focus more on what I am going to do as opposed to thinking too much about what they might do.
What part of Sakkedao's game do you think brings the biggest threat against yours, and what part of yours do you think you can exploit over Sakkedao? Like most Thai’s he’s real good at kicks and clinching, nothing I haven’t seen or dealt with before. He’s lefty which can cause some people problems but having just come off my fight with Saenchai I am used to that look. As for me I always feel I can push the pace and outbox anyone I’m in there with. I need to mix it up and add a few more kicks and knees here as in my fight with Saenchai I got too side tracked on only boxing. He also hasn’t fought much outside of Thailand so he is used to the style and tempo that most Thai’s fight with.
It sounds like Ross’ strategy for victory relies in the differences of styles, trying to outsmart Sakkedao by making him adjust to a more amped-up tempo he does not typically see. My guess is to expect Ross being the aggressor and favoring upper body offenses and swinging his legs much more than he did in his last match. But as for which of his techniques are his favorite tools in the ring? Aside from elbows I couldn’t exactly figure out much. He’s the kind who treats all his anatomical weapons with equal affection: By the way, do you have a particular strike that you love to land? Is it the roundhouse elbow, the flying knee, the cartwheel head-kick? Something else? Yea I love all those but I really just love anything that is exciting to watch, ones that you don’t see most fighters throw. Of course I love using elbows but I constantly get yelled at for getting into elbow wars hahahahaha.
I guess as long as it can bruise and draw blood then he will love to use it, and fighters in the game will fear him for loving to use it. But if the feeling of fear isn’t what people react with, then the other response would be its relative: respect. Muay Thai in America came a long way from where it started. From what I understand, usually the way it was back in the day, whenever somebody brought up an American in a Muay Thai conversation it was like trying to play pesos against dollars. A decade or so ago the stock value of American Nak Muays at the Muay Thai market would’ve had Bear numbers. The exchange of respect was embarrassing. We were just not given the same amount of it back then than we do now, but that perception has changed over the years and with the new players involved in the game. A big part to this conversion of opinions can be credited to fighters like Ross. I was very curious to know his reflections on this, on how we went from getting little respect to having someone like Saenchai acknowledging emerging talents from our part of the world. We clinch over this topic for a few rounds.
Muay Thai in America keeps growing and growing. How do you feel about its progress? Are there some things you see that could propel it faster? In your opinion, what areas need tweaking for it to really blow up and enter the mainstream? Or are you content about it being a relatively underground sport like a certain fraction of Muay Thai fans? It’s one of those things where it has its good and bad points. Unfortunately, for the most part, the more mainstream something gets the more watered down it gets. Of course I want the sport to get big so that people are exposed to what I feel is the most exciting fighting there is and so the shows get bigger and better and hopefully one day fighters are actually able to make a living off of this sport that takes so much sacrifice. But at the same time I look at MMA and see how mainstream it is and see how everyone and their mother trains ‘UFC’ and how they have just flooded the market with it. I enjoy that people that are involved in Mauy Thai are in it for the love of the sport as opposed for the fame and fortune. I definitely want to see the sport keep it’s purity as it grows. The last thing I want to see is it become some watered down Americanized kickboxing. The biggest thing we need in order for its growth is exposure, mainly on television. It’s hard to get sponsors and money for something that only a few thousand people are going to see. It has really been growing over the past few years and I hope it continues to move forward like this.
Personally, what I love about Muay Thai is that it's purely a striking sport and action-orientated, unlike the grappling and BJJ aspects of MMA that sometimes slows the pace of its matches. How about you, what keeps you loyal to Muay Thai? What has been that resistance factor that has kept you from crossing over to the more lucrative sport of MMA or boxing? Well there was a time that I seriously thought about switching over. I guess the biggest thing that kept me from doing it was in knowing that for me it would have to be all or nothing. If I was going to switch then I wanted to be the best and to me that means giving everything that I have to the sport, which would mean I would not compete in Muay Thai anymore. That and the fact that I just love Muay Thai so much. I’ve had MMA and boxing fights and neither could even come close to the feeling I get in a Muay Thai fight. I felt like I just got done in a sparring session or something. There was no rush, no thrill. There’s just something about Muay Thai, its purity, its violence and beauty, nothing can compare.
How do you feel about the talent pool in American Muay Thai? What names out there currently impress you? There’s a few names coming up now that can definitely hang and win on the world class stage. Guys like Joe Schilling, Ky Hollenbeck, Romie Adanza, Michael Mananquil and Chaz Mulkey have proved they can represent America at the top level. And there’s a lot of guys coming up it’s just a matter of them getting the experience and having the right opportunities and hopefully our sport will continue to grow here in America and we can prove to the rest of the world that we belong.
You’ve expressed interest in wanting to fight Fabio Pinca (France) and Liam Harrison (Great Britain). These two fighters are non-American. Is that on purpose? I mean, are you trying to prove something about the quality of American Nak Muays by challenging international ones? I’m just looking at the guys who are at the top of this sport right now as well as guys who I think would make for exciting fights. At this point right now there are only a handful of guys here in America that can even compete at the top and most of us are in different weight classes. I only want to fight the very best and there aren’t any Americans in my weight class who I look at as the best so I don’t really see the point in fighting them other than to stay active.
Being that you are the most recognizable Nak Muay from America, basically its poster-boy, do you feel added pressure to represent? Does it help you at all in your drive to be one of the best in the international scene? I am extremely grateful to be where I am at today in this sport and am flattered that there are people who look at me as that. But no I don’t feel any added pressure. I have given everything I’ve had to this sport from day one. Every time I get in the ring I give it all that I have. Every time I train I give it all that I have and more. I’ve always wanted to be the best that I can possibly be. I never could have dreamt that it would end up where it is today. I just take it one day at a time and give it all that I have and we’ll just see where this ends up.
There’s a good chance it could possibly end up that Kevin Ross will become the American Icon for the sport of Muay Thai, but that type of future, as Ross suggests, depends on what we do each day of our lives. Right now Ross spends his current days planning his dispatch of Petchpayathai, practicing the moves he wants to execute in the ring with Sakkedao, the ones that can draw blood and get the respect, the ones beautiful enough to add to his video portfolio of punishments to immortalize his career.
Last question: You love Muay Thai. It's tatted on your fingers. As a fan and fighter of the sport, and excluding yourself, what is the fight you would absolutely love to see within the next year? Recently Kem Sitsongpeenong has called out Buakaw, I would love to see that go down or a fight between Pinca and Harrison, but I’m biased as they are in my weight class. But more than anything I want to see Muay Thai here in America continue to grow and I’m going to be doing everything I can on my part to see that happen.
On October 21st Kevin Ross will continue to make good on his promise as he and Team USA pushes its international growth against the warriors of Thailand. The event is another opportunity for the sport’s expansion in America and a reality check to see where everyone’s game is at. For Ross it is just another fight to test the might of his will, to experience a new fighter’s style and stretch the dynamics of his skills. It will be interesting to see if Ross demonstrates any upgrades in his techniques, what new improvements the soul collector has gained from camp, and if he will have a different angle to try out against his latest assassination assignment.
After the interview I read repeatedly the answers that Ross had given. I softly recite them methodically to myself as if his words were mine, trying to infiltrate his mind, seeing what more I could find. I reverse-engineer his sentences and ask what would compel a man to say this or that, trying to get a deeper insight into his personality. I am an actor attempting to get into someone’s shoes, a detective trying to match the evidence to the correct suspect. In the end I gamble on my best thought and tell myself what I know about Kevin Ross as a whole, both as the fighter and the man. Realistically, it’s somewhere between minimal and barely nothing, but it’s a start. The shoes didn’t fit and I still have a suspect on the loose.
It goes back to what we heard as children, about not judging someone by what others say, and figuring your own opinion through personal interaction with that person. Now I can work Google’s search engine all day and watch fight footages, hear interviews, and read articles about him, but like Ross had mentioned before, I can do all that but I still won’t have a solid understanding of how someone is until I’m in the fray with him in the ring. Like in fighting, it may take at least a trilogy for two fighters to get a sense of each other’s style, but once a good grip is established between them, that’s when to expect the real fireworks to begin.
But I’m no Nak Muay and will never get first-person knowledge from a real throw down with Ross. I will have to go on the face-value of his words and not force myself to go deeper than that surface. What I discovered from the interview is who he is now at this particular moment in time, but it doesn’t dictate who the Ross of the past was and who the Kevin of the future will be, and I think that is the safest thing I can bet on about him. The reason he’s come up so far in his career is because of adaptability. He is a true survivalist. He’s constantly in motion in his mind, evolving silently beneath the surface where it’s hard to spot the progress, but you can notice the little enhancements by watching a video catalog of his works. You can see that he can shift a strategy in between rounds if the one before was not effective, like when he worked with Kang En on their rematch.
I pitched Ross twelve rounds and he ate them easily. It was a decent test of how flexible his boundaries were. Mentally he is vigorously focused on his upcoming set with Sakkedao, and those rounds have precedence over mine, as they should. So I gave my meeting with Ross a unanimous vote in his favor. His mind is as strong as his heart. I went easy with my questions and kept it about his profession, but I won’t come the same way if a rematch is meant down the road. If anything it was a learning experience and he had taught me something. Next time I’ll be more ambitious, more aggressive. Next time I’ll be going harder. Next time my twelve rounds will be hollow-pointed. Next time I’ll be going for his soul.
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