LATEST INTERVIEW WITH THE SPORTSTENDER JAMES RYAN

- Poster of a surfer in my room circa 1995

The waves crashed along the beach, whipping the sand to the side. The storm crushed the peace of the sea and what came from that massive undertow were waves the size of buildings. He paddled out past the break into the calm, waiting patiently. He was alone, a freak in a violent element he did not belong. His heart rate did not speed up one tick when he saw along the horizon a swell overcasting the set of the closer waves that were approaching. He waited until the shadow filled his face with darkness and began to paddle with a fierceness and determination of something that didn’t belong in this world except for maybe out there in the sea in the heart of this raging tempest.

- ERIC BRADLEY (ME) ON FEELING LUCK, FAME AND A SENSE OF APPROACHING GREATNESS JUST BEYOND THE HORIZON

- Hunter S Thompson

Well I’m finally able to go back to Vegas next week. I can’t wait. Thanksgiving was pretty lame. I was stuck in PA by myself eating a leftover Wegman’s sub (which was excellent by the way). Luckily my roommates came back that night and we got a workout in… so all was not lost. It was cool just to chill out. I’m dying to get back into a training camp with my trainer Luis Hernandez in Vegas. God I miss those blood and sweat filled hours… the frustration of learning new techniques just because you know that if you stick with it, that frustration disappears and you have one more weapon to go to battle with. The past 9 months of my life has set me up to be unbreakable because I have been to hell and back and I came out pale, so I’m not worried about when things get hot in a fight. In other news, I have decided on my nickname… It’s a combination of two that people consistently call me. It’s either “WHAT’S UP SIDESHOW” or “Yo Bradley you’re a freak!!”

So its gonna be Eric “THE FREAK SHOW” Bradley.

“I am skin and bones

I am pointy nose

But it motherf***king makes me try”

-Jane’s Addiction “Ain’t No Right”

1:30am on Monday morning… the act of sleep has grown weird. Need to get back to Vegas so I can return to a normal human being again. I feel like that maniac Kevin Richardson minus the balls to go play practical jokes on hungry lions. Went to my first Penn State wrestling match since 2006 when I was wrestling there and hated it. I hate watching anything from the stands besides the Cirque du Soleli’s Zumanity especially something that clips so close to that torment I have hidden deep inside me from not winning a national championship. That hunger has become my quest for a UFC contract and a chance for vindication. On a side note, I got a ton texts saying that I was all over the Big Ten Network during the match and surprisingly I wasn’t doing anything embarrassing like picking my nose. Although had I known the camera was on me I would have done it just out of principle.

Thanksgiving my favorite fake holiday, another excuse to overeat like thats different than any other day for most people. No disrespect. With events like Occupy and Penn State and now Syracuse, thanksgiving still baffles me as we clearly know it wasn’t the joyous occasion when the pilgrims met the Indians. Okay now I’m tired, turns out I’m human after all.

Muahhhh

EB

- Juvenal

Haha… I’m all for taking the most positive side of everything, so when asked about how and why I went to jail, I just tell them I’m a bold person and sometimes it gets me in trouble but I’d do it all over again if I had to. Like Harlan Ellison would say “Curse the Lesson, Bless the Knowledge”. That’s been my experience with 99% of my decisions. I suppose there a 1% of inaction that I would go back and change but I can’t remember it and I really don’t care to. I’ve also learned that if you want to make it where you’re going, you got to get use to dealing with a lot of reasons why you could quit and give up. Luckily, I’m not built like that and can’t imagine what life would be like if I was. On the topic of not quitting, I can’t resist the opportunity to bring up Timmy 4 Fingers (T4F), my interim trainer in good ole Happy Valley minus all the sex scandals.

So I’m back in full on MMA training mode. For the first few weeks I have been working on extreme conditioning, strength training and shadow boxing led by a heartless and a fingerless self-proclaimed fitness guru. Along with wrestling with the university team members and olympic hopefuls, I live and train with Timmy 4 fingers, a former Penn State Wrestling captain with no sympathy for lactic acid or anyone possessing all ten digits in anything other than their phone number. We go until you it feels like you are about to pass out from some sort of reverse blood flow from the brain and just as you want to throw in the towel, T4F calls for another set in homage to the one that got away.

Timmy Four Fingers

Warning Graphic Pictures below

CLICK TO SEE MORE OF MASTER TRAINER T4F

THE FIRST STEPS AFTER A HARD MILE OUT OF MY NIGHTMARE

So, 253 days locked in a concrete casket is no easy way to spend your days and nights, but I did it, and it was some of the hardest mental-toughness training I have ever done. I don’t recommend it; though it made those 6am mornings running up and down Beaver stadium with another Penn State wrestler on my back seem like a moment of euphoric bliss. It got to the point where I missed being punched in the face, if only to taste that feeling of being in a cage, which was ironic, because I was in a cage. Those days are far behind me (along with the reputation of anything else that happens around that stadium.). I now am beginning to reclaim those 253 days and some.

I learned some valuable lessons for anyone ever in my situation:

1) Fleeing to London and coming back a week later is f***king expensive.

2) It’s cool to tell people you were a fugitive.

3) Jail food not only tastes like sh*t, it gives you the sh*ts. Be ready to go on a diet.

4) Bring lube. Nah, I’m just kidding. Or am I?

5) Phone calls cost $10 for 15 minutes - learn how to write, and use those weird sticky things people call stamps.

Click for a Pic of Me Right Out of Jail…. 

Warning Self Photography