Melvin Guillard Opens Up On Blackzilians Departure: ‘I felt like I couldn’t win with that team’

“Ultimately what lead me to leave was just, I felt in my heart that I couldn’t win with that team. They’re a great group of guys, the coaches are world renowned, but the chemistry for me, there was no recipe for success.”

“When I step into a gym, I want to have a game plan all the way through. I want to see it through and I want to have coaches that will be on my side on my hip, day in and day out, and I didn’t really have that with a lot of coaches there. The only coach that I have that relationship with physically right now is Dr. Ron Tripp. He’s my judo coach. So no matter what team I end up at, he’s always going to be in my corner.”

“They’re a great group of guys. They have so much talent on that team, but I just felt in my heart, me personally, that I couldn’t win with that team. So I just had to move on. It was a mutual understanding. I didn’t get to say goodbye to all the guys, but I got to talk with Glenn (Robinson), who is the owner. I got to talk with some of the coaches there and I just felt it was time for Melvin to move on and look for something bigger and better.”

The former Blackzilian had hoped to return to his former training home at Team Greg Jackson but the team over at Jacksons voted against his return.

“That was a little bit of a slap in the face right there. I was excited about that and I honestly thought that’s where I was going to end up and I started seeing tweets seeing they voted me out and this and that.”

“If you want real truth and the truth of everything, you always call Cowboy (Donald Cerrone). I reached out to Cowboy and he said yeah a couple people voted against it, a lot of people were for it. But then I talked to Coach Greg eventually and he said some of the guys were on a different page and maybe in the future, if we can get some of those guys back on the same page, then they have no problem with me coming back then, but now is just not a good time.”

“Those were the words of Coach Greg Jackson and I took it on the chin; it was cool. It hurt my feelings a little bit, but at the same time, it was nobody’s fault but my own. I left Jackson’s and I think my timing was so bad. I left during a time that was so bad. I left during the time when Jon Jones and Rashad Evans were beefing and they were fighting and it was almost like, if you were outside looking in, you would definitely say you chose Rashad over Jon. That’s how I made myself look and I understand how they felt. So it’s no big deal.”

(quotes via mmaweekly.com)