Introducing "The Ultimate Fighter Heavyweights": Kimbo Slice

You already recognize some of names and faces from the upcoming season of “The Ultimate Fighter,” but there’s a lot you probably still don’t know about this group of 16 heavyweight warriors. Each weekday between now and the Sept. 16 premiere of “The Ultimate Fighter Heavyweights,” FIGHT! will introduce two cast members leading up to the introduction of our TUF bloggers.

Kevin Ferguson aka Kimbo Slice
Age: 35
Height: 6’1”
Weight: 235 lbs
Hometown: Nassau, Bahamas
Trains: Miami, Fla. – Team Kimbo
MMA record: 3-1

Kevin Ferguson was born in the Bahamas and moved to Miami, Fla. with his mother and two brothers. A natural athlete, Feguson was a star linebacker at Miami Palmetto High School and was later awarded an athletic scholarship to the University of Miami, though he never played a down and left after just a year and a half. After college, Slice struggled to make ends meet, and lived out of his car when employment was impossible to find.

Slice eventually found work as a bodyguard for a pornography company, Reality Kings, and used his natural fighting skills to protect his clients. In Miami, word spread about Slice’s explosive punching power and soon he was a part of an unsanctioned street fighting circuit: all striking, no grappling and the crowd that showed up would decide a winner if both men were still standing at the end of the battle. More often than not, Slice was the one standing, and he became a YouTube sensation as his exploits were videotaped and posted at the speed of broadband for all to see.

Millions of YouTube views later, Slice transitioned into mixed martial arts in order to provide for his fiancée and six children. He fought for the now-defunct EliteXC, headlining the first ever MMA card on broadcast television. He compiled a 3-0 record before losing to Seth Petruzelli in front of millions of viewers.

Critics cited the loss as evidence that Slice was never a real mixed martial artist, rather just a product of marketing and the YouTube generation. Slice joined the cast of The Ultimate Fighter in attempt to prove them wrong.

Learn more about the cast of “The Ultimate Fighter Heavyweights.”