MMA fighter continues to battle his demons outside the ring

Brandon Schneider, or more commonly known as “Brandon the Brute” in the amateur MMA circles, will be fighting on March 14 in Mesquite.

The fight is a Tuff-N-Uff fight called Mayhem in Mesquite VI, which will be at the Casablanca Hotel and Casino at 7 p.m.

Schneider is back after a year off.

The MMA fighter has never been knocked out by another fighter but he has been taken out. The force that took him out was bigger and far more powerful than any fighter he has ever faced. He is now fighting the biggest fight of his life outside the ring. This fight has been with drugs.

The young fighter at 6 foot six inches tall and 205 pounds says he has been battling with drugs since high school and he is now 29. He made a comeback in 2013 and everyone thought he had beat it. The whole town was pulling for him, but he fell again in 2014.

“It just never stops,” he said sadly. “It’s a disease. It’s continuous and it never ends. Once you get addicted you have to realize you are an addict.”

In 2014 he hit a car while riding his motorcycle and his demons came back.

“I was in an accident and was introduced to the pain pills and my addiction just took over,” the fighter said. “I should not have taken them. I should have stuck with non-narcotics because I should have known better.”

This last bout with drugs kept him out of the ring for an entire year.

Schneider ended up taking methamphetamine and this led to his arrest and a rehabilitation center.

He explained why he could not face the pain of the accident.

“My whole body ran into the car,” Schneider said. “It was a whole body experience. I could handle the pain of fighting but this was different. I train for that pain. I get punched every day. I had built an immunity to that.”

He said getting hit by the car shocked his whole system.

“My legs were messed up and it was hard to do anything and I was off work for months,” he said.

The big mistake he made last year was trying to resist the temptation on his own without support. He said at the time of the accident he was not going to support meetings, but he is now.

“You need a support system,” Schneider said. “You need people that have been through what you have been through. You need to be able to discuss with these people at any given time what you are going through.”

He said people who end up doing it by themselves end up going through a dry spell and then end up going back to it.

“I am kicking myself for not using that support,” he said. “I made a mistake. We all make mistakes. I live with mine. I still brush myself off and I handle it like a man.”

Schneider talked about how athletes are held to a higher standard.

“The bar is really high,” he said. “Fighters use drugs. You think they don’t, but they do. To avoid that crowd, I do my thing and I get out. I don’t hang out and I don’t associate with people who use.”

Schneider feels badly about his latest bout with his demons but when it comes down to it he said the only person that he let down was himself.

“I didn’t let anyone else down,” he said. “They already knew my past and what I had been through. Once I got hit on that bike and I started taking pain pills something was going to happen.”

The hardest part of his recent brush with the law was explaining to his six-year-old son what happened to him. He had to face his son from behind bars and that was hard to do.

“I hated explaining things to my son through a mirror in a cage and I hated that,” he said.

He explained when he was locked up he thought of his freedom and not making the right decisions. He had time to think about the bad decisions he made and he was angry at himself because his poor decisions took away from the time he spent with his son.

For Schneider he is starting over once again. He has been here before and it hurts, but he won’t give up.

Schneider fought four fights in 2013 and went 2-2 and one fight in 2014 in which he lost a split decision to Tony Murphy in three rounds in January of 2014. In August of 2013 he fought his only title fight for the 205-pound division, which was a Tuff-N-Uff title, where he fought Cedric Smith. Schneider lost by decision in the third round.

All three of Schneider’s losses have been by decision. Schneider remains the only active mixed martial arts fighter from Pahrump fighting as an amateur.

The MMA fighter has never lost by submission or knockout.

“The reason being I have the determination,” he said. “I have the will power to keep fighting. I keep moving and keep going.”

Schneider has two coaches, Robert Wilson and Brian Thelaner from Mix It Up Academy.

They have both been coaching Schneider for three years now.

Thelaner feels Schneider is a tough fighter and has what it takes to be successful.

“At the moment we are following our game plan,” he said. “We are preparing him so he won’t gas out. We want him to be able to throw the punches towards the end of the fight.”

For his fight at the Casablanca, Schneider will be fighting a six-foot-seven-inch beast named Milorad Nelica. Nelica won his only fight by KO/TKO against Roy Hancox in August of 2014. He took out Hancox with a kick to the midsection and then several jabs to the head. He is ranked seventh of 43 active Nevada Light Heavyweights. Schneider is looking to improve his ranking and is currently ranked 22nd.

The Pahrump fighter feels he is in good shape for the bout and trains with a sparring partner that is slightly larger than him. His partner is 6 foot six inches tall and 275 pounds.

Schneider said Nelica is a stand-up fighter. Schneider himself likes to grapple and then get into ground and pound.

If Schneider can beat his opponent then he will fight for the title of the 205-pound division.

“I have tested the waters yesterday and we are going to test them today,” he said. That means “I am going to do 45 minutes of non-stop cardio.”

For all his naysayers, Schneider has this to say, “If you don’t believe in me, just watch,” Schneider said. “I am done talking. Just watch what I do. Action speaks louder than words. Thank you for the support.”