Drew Fickett

Andrew Robert Fickett (born December 14, 1979) is an American mixed martial artist who competes in the Lightweight division. A professional competitor since 1999, Fickett has also formerly competed for the UFC, Strikeforce, DREAM, Cage Rage, the XFC, MFC, and King of the Cage.

Fickett is from Tucson, Arizona and began training in karate when he was 10 years old. When Fickett was in high school he was a wrestler and practiced judo, with MMA legend Don Frye's original trainer. He was the second best wrestler in the state of Arizona during his junior year and began his career in MMA shortly after graduating from high school. After his college wrestling career at Pima Community College was ended prematurely due to a serious motorcycle accident, Fickett dropped out of college and moved to live in Phoenix, Arizona for two years to become trained as a mixed martial artist.

Early career

Fickett began his professional MMA career in 1999 and quickly amassed an undefeated record of 12–0 in the first 20 months of his career. Before entering the UFC, Fickett had a record of 24–2 with notable wins over Dennis Hallman, Carlo Prater and Kenny Florian.

Ultimate Fighting championship

UFC President, Dana White stated that Fickett was originally supposed to be a contestant on the first season of The Ultimate Fighter, but upon watching his bout with Kenny Florian at a small mixed martial arts event, he had decided to sign Florian onto the show in his place. Fickett defeated Florian, but shortly after was incarcerated. White then went with Florian.

Fickett made his Ultimate Fighting Championship debut in February 2005 at UFC 51, losing to Nick Diaz via TKO. He went 4–3 in his tenure with the organization, with notable victories over Kurt Pellegrino, Josh Neer and a come-from-behind win over Josh Koscheck.

Post-UFC

Following his release from the UFC in 2007, Fickett stayed busy fighting for a number of smaller tier promotions including HDNet Fights, Cage Rage and Strikeforce.

Fickett had been scheduled to fight Ryan Ford for the Maximum Fighting Championship welterweight title at MFC 17: Hostile Takeover on July 25, 2008. However, after signing an agreement for the MFC fight, he signed another agreement to fight Luke Stewart at the Strikeforce: Melendez vs. Thomson event on June 27, 2008, as a replacement for an injured Joe Riggs. This placed him in breach of his agreement with MFC, which stated that he would not fight for five weeks prior to his MFC date. As a result, he ended up being removed from both fight cards, and MFC president/owner Mark Pavelich declared that Fickett would never again fight in the MFC.

From August 2008 to August 2009, Fickett suffered the worst year of his professional career, with only 2 wins versus 8 losses. Fickett later revealed in interviews that he had not even trained for these fights.

Fickett returned in 2010 with a renewed focus. He defeated fellow UFC veteran Derrick Noble by submission, ending his 5 fight losing streak. In September 2010, he won the one night Shine: Lightweight Grand Prix which saw him fight three times over the course of the evening. He ended all of the fights in the first round via submission and declared, "I'm back" in his post-fight interview.

Maximum Fighting Championship

Fickett then signed a multi-fight contract with the Maximum Fighting Championship. His first fight was against Matt Veach at MFC 28 on February 25, 2011. He won via submission in the first round. MFC announced his release from the organization following his loss to Tatsuya Kawajiri.

Independent Circuit

Fickett faced Luis Felix at CES MMA 22 on March 14, 2014. He lost by KO (head kick) in the second round.