Four Weekends, Three States - 17 wins, 3 losses - 2 Championship Belts
as appeared in The Crete News Sports Section - August 13, 2008
written and submitted by Jim Small

Team GETYASOME finished four consecutive weekends of cage fighting action winning 17 of 20 matches and bringing home two championship titles. The venture had the team traveling to Missouri, Iowa, and twice to South Dakota... racking up nearly 2000 miles per vehicle!

The consecutive trips began back on July 12th with a trip to the Rage of Kansas City outside event in Kansas City, Missouri. Jeremy Small stated the action for Team GETYASOME with a tapout victory over Marcus Mack using a rear naked choke at 1:35 of the first round. B.J. Drew made quick work of Dustin Schnakenberg with a guillotine choke at 0:50 of round one. After being dropped by a punch early in the fight, Donavon Winters, of Beatrice, battled back to defeat Jed Mamie with the referee stopping the contest at 2:05 of round one. If you were scoring Charlie DuBray's fight, he would have lost the first round and most of the second round on a judge's score card. However, in spectacular fashion, he came from behind and ended the fight with a guillotine choke over Chris Andrade at 1:30 of the second round. By the end of the evening, people were asking... who are these guys from Nebraska!

July 19th had the team traveling north to the Fort Randall Casino just outside of Lake Andes, South Dakota, for another outside event. Several of the cage combatants were involved in four-man tournaments at the Tri-State Cage Fighting event. Dan Risseeuw, residing in Lincoln but originating from Valentine, battled in the 4-man lightweight tournament in front of a large contingent of family and friends. Risseeuw cruised through his bracket, winning his first match over Carlos Claudio via tapout due to a rear naked choke at 1:24 of round one and winning the bracket championship match over Dana Igou as the refereed stopped the fight due to strikes at 0:29 of the first round. Donavon Winters, of Beatrice, competed in the 4-man welterweight tournament where he defeated Cheyenne Ziegler via tapout due to a guillotine choke at 0:57 of round one of his opening match-up. Winters then claimed the bracket championship by defeating Bobby Theroes via referee stoppage due to strikes at 1:40 of round one. Jesh Wright stepped up a weight class to fight in the light heavyweight 4-man tournament. Wright was controlling much of the action in his opening battle but faded in the third round and succumbed to a guillotine choke at 0:25 of round three. Wright came back out with a win in the consolation match-up when Caleb Metzer failed to answer the bell to begin round two. Jeremy Small was on the fight card in a lone middleweight match-up where he defeated Josh Hudelson via tapout due to an arm bar at 1:18 of round one.

Team activity continued on July 26th at the Tri-State Cage Fighting's Repercussions at the Tyson Event Center in Sioux City, IA. Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) World Lightweight Champion, Sean Sherk, made a guest appearance at the event. Team GETYASOME represented the Hands 2 War training facility by going undefeated on the evening fight card. Tahner Thiem, returned back to the cage after recovering from an injury sustained back in April, made quick work by defeating Cotrell Bailey via tapout due to a rear naked choke at 1:37 of the first round. B.J. Drew and Jeremy Small battled a father and son combo - Small defeated Mike Weltz Sr. via tapout due to an arm bar at 1:49 of round one and Drew defeated Mike Weltz Jr. via tapout due to a guillotine choke at 1:38 of round one. Donavon Winters closed the team's evening with a dramatic win over Nate Martin, an experienced professional boxer, with a tapout victory. Winters needed just 31 seconds of the first round to finish Martin.

Finally, on August 2nd, Team GETYASOME closed their four consecutive weeks of competition by returning to South Dakota - this trip was to Tri-State Cage Fighting's (T.C.F.) outside event in Yankton, SD. Tahner Thiem defeated a much experienced Devin Fisher via tapout due to strikes at 1:24 of round one. Unfortunately, Thiem reinjured the same hand that took him out of competition back in April. Donavon Winters appeared in one of the non-title feature fights of the evening against Tri-State Cage Fighting's former Central Division Middleweight Champion, Anthony Smith. After an action-packed first two rounds, which most likely was split on the score card, Smith's experience took over as he came away with a victory over Winters when Winters tapped out due to a rear naked choke at 1:26 of round three. B.J. Drew opened the evening's title fight portion of the fight card with a dominating tapout win due a guillotine choke at 2:10 of the first round over Paul Snodgrass. Drew was crowned the Tri-State Cage Fighting Western Division Light Heavyweight Champion. Drew currently is also the Elite Cage Fights Light Heavyweight Champion out of Springfield, Missouri. Jeremy Small fell short in his attempt to obtain a title belt. Roberto Rojas defeated Small via referee stoppage due to strikes at 2:57 of the first round. Small remains the #1 contender for the T.C.F. Central Division title as a middleweight. Closing the Team GETYASOME activity was Charlie DuBray. DuBray punished the body of Kyle Medearis causing the referee to step in and stop the match due to strikes at 1:37 of round one. DuBray was crowned the new T.C.F. Western Division Featherweight Champion; he also holds the T.C.F. Central Division Featherweight Championship title.

The team will take a few weeks off from competition, but will remain actively training at the Hands 2 War mixed martial arts gym located in Crete Plaza. Team GETYASOME sports a 53-15 record, nearly a 78% winning percentage. If you are interested in finding out more information, contact information can be found at http://www.teamgetyasome.com or by calling B.J. at (402) 450-2960.

Sideline Play: Crete fighter likes to mix things up

BY KRIS KNOWLTON / Lincoln Journal Star
http://journalstar.com/articles/2008/05/25/sports/doc4838dd88d5b9d615491358.txt
Sunday, May 25, 2008

NAME: B.J. Drew.

HOMETOWN: Crete.

THE LOWDOWN: 24-year-old works 40 hours a week as a pipe welder in Lincoln by day, and trains to become a Ultimate Fighting Champion by night. He lives the kind of double life that is usually only found in comic books, and Drew wants to make a superhero-like impact.

Drew hails from the small town of Greenfield, Mo., and moved to Crete a year and a half ago to pursue a career in mixed martial arts. So far, he’s built a 6-3 record as a amateur competitor in the Tri-State Cage Fighting League and hopes he’ll soon be able to ditch the 9-5 workday so he can concentrate fully on chasing his dream.

“This is the path I’ve chosen,” Drew said. “I get up at 5:15 in the morning, start with my diet stuff, then I go to work an eight-hour day, and then I always train somewhere every night and it’s like that six days a week. I’m to the point right now where I do about whatever I have to do to make it.”

Drew describes himself as a specialist on the ground, and has won most of his fights by submission.

FIGHTER WITH A PURPOSE: “Growing up I was kind of a bad guy,” Drew said. “Not bad, I mean I was a good kid but I fought all the time. As I got older I started bouncing at clubs and just kind of stupid stuff.”

Drew said the strength he found in God helped steer him clear of the dangerous path he was headed down. Drew is opening a gym in Crete to help spread his message.

“I like to tell people that before everything I am a Christian,” he said. “I use my gym as an outreach program to show people that you don’t have to be a knucklehead to be a legit tough guy. You don’t have to go out and party and start fights, and do all the stupid stuff. We try to show people that you don’t have to be this certain stereotype to be the tough-guy fighter.”

WIFE’S INITIAL REACTION: “She was really nervous before my first fight, and so was I,” Drew said. “But now, it’s to the point where this woman is trying to find fights for me. She loves it. She knows I’m good at it and passionate about it.”

UNDER ALEXANDER’S WING: Drew trains with Houston Alexander, a UFC fighter from Omaha.

“I wouldn’t say that he’s actually one of my coaches or anything, but he’s kind of taken me under his wing,” Drew said. “I train side-by-side with him like he’s my buddy from forever. He’s been talking about maybe coming in the corner with me for my next fight.”

BARBARIAN FIGHTING?: “There’s a lot of people out there that think this is nothing but a brutal blood sport that is done by a bunch of barbarian meatheads,” Drew said. “But these guys are masters at numerous fighting arts. They’ve dedicated hours and years learning these arts and putting them all together to create one complete package. There’s a lot of dedication, training, and mental awareness to what we’re doing.”

IS MMA A SPORT?: “Just try it out, man,” Drew said. “Come try one training session if you think you’re in shape. Come roll around for five minutes, we don’t have to strike, we can just grapple for one five-minute session and we’ll see what you think about it being a sport after that. People don’t understand. I was a college football player, high school football player, basketball player, baseball player, track runner, and I’ve never been in better shape than I am today probably.”

BEST MMA MOMENT: “I had a guy that lived six hours away e-mail me and told me that he wanted to come down and train with us because he liked what we were about and that we did everything through Christ,” Drew said. “My opinion is if I can get one guy in the world to turn away from doing wrong stuff, that’s probably the best thing I’m looking for.”

FUTURE IN MMA: “Hopefully, with all of my training, a little dirt under my fingernails, and a little blood on my elbows — or wherever I’ve got to have it, I guess — you’ll see me there under the big lights and first and foremost you’ll see me thank God for the opportunity,” Drew said.

Crete Cage Fighters Travel to Sioux City
as appeared in The Crete News Sports Section - April 16, 2008
written and submitted by Jim Small

Saturday, April 12th, Crete fighters from Hands 2 War Mixed Martial Arts traveled to Sioux City, IA to compete in the Tri-State Cage Fighting (T.C.F.) event declared the Unification in the Cage. Representing Team Getyasome were B.J. Drew, Charlie DuBray, Jeremy Small and Jesh Wright.

First up from Team Getyasome was 168 pound Jesh Wright (2 – 0) entering the octagon cage against Jaime Koopman (2 – 2). Wright controlled much of the action and came away with a 3-round unanimous decision on the judges score card and maintained his undefeated mixed martial arts record at 3 – 0.

B.J. Drew (4 – 2), current T.C.F. Central Division Light-Heavyweight Champion, cruised to a non-title fight victory by submission via a rear-naked choke at 1:48 of the first round over Dan Lara (2 – 1) of Los Angeles, CA. Drew had just returned at 2:30 a.m. that morning from Boston, MA, where he was involved in tryouts for the next season of The Ultimate Fighter television series, one of the most popular television shows on the Spike Network.

Billed as one of the feature fights of the evening between two undefeated division champions – Charlie DuBray (6 – 0), T.C.F. North Division Lightweight Champion, versus Blaze Gill (3 – 0), T.C.F. Central Division Lightweight Champion, met in a bout that could unify two titles with a win by DuBray. The fast paced, full of action fight ended with Gill coming away with a victory when the referee stopped the fight at 1:07 of the second round. Both fighters retained their respective division titles.

172-pound Jeremy Small (3 – 1) stepped into the cage against undefeated Ryan Shell (5 – 0) in a welterweight battle. Small maintained his composure and survived a first round guillotine choke and exploded with a quick TKO 16 seconds into the second round to improve his record to 4 – 1.

Former Crete wrestler Tahner Thiem (4 – 0) competed in the fight card’s feature title fight against Wes Clark (16 – 6) for the T.C.F. Central Division Welterweight Championship. The back and forth chess match between the two fighters ended 2:24 into the second round when Clark knocked Thiem out to retain the welterweight title.

Also representing Hands 2 War Mixed Martial Arts was Ron Guay (1 – 0), of Lincoln, verus Charley Bailey (1 – 0). Ron survived a tough battle and made it through the first round to come away with a win by tapout via a triangle choke hold at 1:06 of the second round. For more information on Hands 2 War Mixed Martial Arts, check out http://www.teamgetyasome.com.

What Do Some Wrestlers Do After Their High School Careers Are Over? as appeared in The Crete News Sports Section - March 12, 2008
written and submitted by Jim Small

A few go on to wrestle in college… some leave wrestling behind totally and just pursue life in general. And then others get into the cage!

Mixed martial arts, made popular by organizations such as the UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championships) and the WEC (World Extreme Cagefighting) has provided another avenue of competition for former Crete Cardinal wrestlers – Charlie DuBray, Jeremy Small, Jim Small, Tahner Thiem and Jesh Wright. DuBray, both Small’s and Wright have joined B.J. Drew and Dan Risseeuw (a 2007 graduate from Valentine, NE) to form Team GetYaSome and they compete in various events around the Midwest.

On March 8th, Team GetYaSome competed in the Tri-State Cage Fighting event in Sioux City, IA. Jesh Wright, middleweight, made his second appearance in the cage and won by tapout via a rear-naked choke 0:55 into the first round. His record now stands at two wins with no losses. Jeremy Small, middleweight, coming back from an injury and defeat back in December won by tapout via an arm bar 1:35 in the second round. He now has three wins with the one loss. Dan Risseeuw was in the fight of the night – the Tri-State Cage Fighting Lightweight title fight. He lost by referee stoppage 0:36 into third period and now has three wins and one defeat. B.J. Drew, four fights after his MMA debut for the Light Heavyweight Tri-State Cage Fighting title, made his second attempt for the title belt. This time, the outcome was different and he was crowned the Tri-State Cage Fighting Light-Heavyweight Champion. He holds a 4 – 1 record. Charlie DuBray battled in a contender’s match, winner to get a title shot in April for the Tri-State Cage Fighting Featherweight title. Charlie maintained his undefeated record (5 – 0) in dramatic fashion, winning by referee stoppage 2:00 of the 2nd round.

April 12th, several will return to the cage again in Sioux City, IA. Three fighters from Team GetYaSome and Crete will be involved in title fights: Charlie DuBray for featherweight title, Tahner Thiem for the welterweight title, and B.J. Drew will defend his light-heavyweight title. For ticket information, check out: Tri-State Cage Fighting.

For more information:

call Jim at (402) 304-1465 or e-mail me at jim@teamgetyasome.com.