MMA vet Brian Foster: Tonight's GLORY 11 kickboxing match 'an audition'

UFC vet and current MMA fighter Brian Foster is going against what’s typical when it comes to combat sports athletes transitioning across disciplines.

More often than not, it will be boxers, kickboxers, muay Thai fighters, wrestlers, judo players, jiu-jitsu practitioners and others who will try to break into the MMA world, but rarely does it go the other way around.

Tonight Foster makes his professional kickboxing debut against Raymond Daniels (23-0) at GLORY 11. The event airs on Spike TV from Sears Center Arena near Chicago.

One would think the shift in sports would be a difficult for Foster, who owns a 19-6 MMA record with 19 stoppage wins. However, he admits it was a far less challenging process than he first believed.

“It’s a pretty easy transition for me,” Foster told MMAjunkie.com “I’m typically a boxer anyhow, so I just focus on my standup. That was the start of the process, and this is the cultivation of it.”

Obviously the biggest contrast between MMA and kickboxing is the fact the latter does not consist of any grappling. For a fighter like Foster, who has been submitted in five of his six MMA defeats, those are the perfect rules to finally show everything he can do in the striking department.

“The biggest thing is I don’t have to worry about takedowns,” he said. “In mixed martial arts, you could see that was the one main thing I struggled with – my jiu-jitsu skills. I would get so overzealous with my striking that it would sometimes get me in trouble. Now I don’t have to worry about that stuff. I can just focus on my standup and my boxing.”

Even though Foster has cut out MMA almost entirely from his workout routine in the lead-up to tonight’s event, he’s hardly ready to walk away from a sport in which he’s found so much success.

In fact, the 29-year-old feels the additional attention paid to his striking will become beneficial when he does go back to MMA competition.

“It is [helping me with MMA], I see a lot more countering going on, and I’ve gotten better at my offense,” Foster said. “In MMA I’m just a counter-striker. It has helped me in my offense and keeps my mind open to situations. I think I’ve got a pretty good formula going.”

Foster competed in the UFC five times from 2009-2010 but was released from the organization and forced into a temporary hiatus after doctors discover a brain hemorrhage during a pre-fight medical exam. Foster had won his last two bouts with the UFC before being released, with his final win coming against red-hot welterweight contender Matt Brown.

He was cleared to compete in 2011 but continued his career outside the UFC with organizations such as Cage Warriors and Victory Fighting Championship.

Considering where “The Immortal” is now at in his career, Foster is definitely envious of Brown’s situation and has the goal of one day returning to the UFC to finish the run he started.

“I still feel I have some stuff to show,” Foster said. “I have some skills and I would just like the chance to fix that if all else. … It’s something I would definitely like to finish if given the opportunity.”

As of right now, though, Foster is focused entirely on GLORY.

Saturday’s fight represents a brand new opportunity for him, and while he doesn’t know what his kickboxing future holds beyond the one event, he feels his success or failure will be determined on the outcome of his showdown with Daniels.

“For me this is kind of an audition – show what I’m made of, my style of fighting,” he said. “If they want to take the relationship further, than we’ll see what happens.”