Tank Abbott tried to attack Bader, but couldn’t jump railing

Tank Abbott says he tried to enter the cage at Bellator 226.

The main event of Bellator 226 ended in a no-contest due to a controversial and debated eye poke. Shortly after the anti-climactic end to the title bout between Cheick Kongo and Ryan Bader, Quinton Jackson stepped in and started an altercation with the heavyweight champion.

Interestingly enough, UFC pioneer Tank Abbott was in attendance and says he tried to jump Bader as well. He says he’s friends with Kongo and Jackson after being in the same gym as them, and wanted to take out Bader after the scuffle.

The 54-year-old says it didn’t push through, because he couldn’t get over the railing.

“I was just at the Cheick Kongo fight in San Jose a couple of weeks back and it got stopped by a thumb in the eye. Who knows if it was intentional or not, but it was a no-contest. There was a little skirmish after the fact, and I was trying to make my way into the cage but I couldn’t get over the railing,” he told Submission Radio.

“Oh, hell yeah, I was going to throw down with Rampage and Cheick, but the barrier seemed to be too significant for me to get over at the time and I was kind of freaking my wife out, so I calmed down. But I was definitely on my way.”

Abbott explained what he would’ve done had he got in, claiming that Bader got lucky that he couldn’t.

“I was just gonna show them what a real thumb up looks like. The one you kind of deliver on the street, you know what I mean? But things were in my way I couldn’t get over. So, things happen for a reason once again. So, he (Bader) lucked out.”

Abbott has retired from competition and last fought back in 2013. The charismatic brawler, who made his debut back at UFC 6, has been recovering from a liver transplant. He says he survived “over six strokes” and looks a lot slimmer these days.