Kai Kamaka was already back in Dad mode, setting up the toys and getting the food ready in the backyard of his grandmother’s home in Las Vegas.
A day after notching a unanimous decision to punch his ticket into the semifinals of the featherweight season in the Professional Fighter’s League in Sioux City, S.D., the Kamehameha alumnus had returned to the 100-plus-degree summer Vegas heat and planned on enjoying the evening with his family, including his five kids, watching Saturday’s UFC 303 event.
He was still feeling the effects of a grueling 15-minute fight against Pedro Carvalho when he found out the mixed martial arts portion of his weekend wasn’t done just yet.
“I thought I was wrapped up and kind of decompressing from a fight and a fight week, a fight training camp, and then I got the call the weekend is not over,” Kamaka said in a phone interview Monday.
Dan Ige, a longtime friend and training partner, was in the process of securing a fight on hours’ notice to save the co-main event of the UFC pay-per-view at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Brian Ortega, who was set to fight Diego Lopes, fell ill with a 103-degree fever and was not going to be cleared by the Nevada State Athletic Commission.
Ige, a Kahuku alum, needed three guys to be in his corner and there was never a doubt for Kamaka he would be one of them.
“I’m kind of not watching the fights because I’m watching the kids swim and (coach Eric Nicksick ) calls me again and was like, ‘Hey, you’ve got to meet me at this park right across South Point and we don’t have that much time.’”
Kamaka rushed to get in his car and saw Nicksick and Ige in the car behind him as they went to meet at the park. They then headed straight to T-Mobile Arena, where they were stopped by security before they could even park.
“(Security ) were not even aware what was going on. They were stopping us and Ali Abdelaziz, one of Dan’s managers, he tells the security guards, ‘We don’t have much time, we don’t have much time,’ and we rolled past the security guards,” Kamaka said.
UFC officials met the team inside the security gate and instructed them where to park.
Ige went straight to the scale to weigh in at a catchweight at 164.5 pounds and then the team went to the locker room, where more UFC personnel were busy switching out the Ortega’s UFC gear for Ige clothes.
At one point, Kamaka found himself looking around wondering if this all was actually happening.
“I couldn’t believe where I was at or what I was doing, ” he said. “Even Dan said he was in a dream when we were walking out like, ‘What is going on?’
With about 90 minutes left before the walkouts, the team sat together and came up with a last-second gameplan based off whatever they could figure out.
Roman Dolidze, who is teammates with Kamaka and Ige at Xtreme Couture, was in the fight before Ige’s, which Nicksick also had to corner.
Ige hit mitts with Nicksick as he normally does before a fight, but then Kamaka had to take over helping Ige warm up with Nicksick headed to the cage.
“My body was a little bit tender,” Kamaka said. “Coach Eric was like, ‘Kai, you brought your gear?’ And I was like, ‘No.’ I brought my backpack and my fanny pack and I had my PFL gloves in there from the night before. It just so happened I had a backpack with me. It wasn’t even because I had anything for the fight. Nobody did.”
Ige, who was asleep getting a massage when he got the call to fight, made the walk to the cage and ultimately lost a unanimous decision to Lopes. Ige was the fresher fighter after 15 minutes and won the third round convincingly on all three judges’ scorecards.
Kamaka was right there for his buddy in his corner as Hawaii’s top mixed martial arts fighters again made headlines in a UFC cage. Following Max Holloway’s stunning last-second knockout of Justin Gaethje at the marquee UFC 300 event in April after moving up a weight class, Ige only added to his MMA career and fighter status as the first guy to step in and fight on hours’ notice.
“We’re not going to overthink it too much with fighting,” Kamaka said. “There are all of these business factors into taking fights, but the fight itself comes from the heart—that’s not from a business standpoint. Nobody fights because they want to be a good businessman. We don’t overthink the fighting part too much. We let the people who handle the business part handle the business.”
Kamaka says he will force himself to rest for a week before getting back into camp. His next fight is Aug. 23 in Washington D.C., against 2022 PFL featherweight champion Brendan Loughnane with a spot in the $1 million final at stake.
