For the people that knew them, it should have been obvious that Caros Fodor and Ben “Phoenix Jones” Fodor would one day step into a cage to do what they’d always done privately. There were too many signs it was inevitable.
There was the time Caros terrified Ben by “shooting” him with a Carbine 15—which was thankfully loaded with a blank. There was the time Ben decided to launch Caros out a second-story window, and Ben grabbed his brother’s wrist at the last-second, forcing both into the horrific crash. There was the time when Ben choked Caros out cold with a triangle—during Christmas. There were the times they took turns throwing each other into piles of farm animal dung. There was knives, baseball bats and broomsticks. There was blood, stitches and broken bones.
Almost as long as both Fodors have been around, they’ve been fighting each other. The simmering tension between them has occasionally exploded. But still, a cage fight with sanctioned rules and a paycheck? Both acknowledge it’s an extreme yet inescapable step, that their personalities virtually guaranteed they would end up standing across from each other in competition waiting to punch, kick and elbow their past history to bits.
“We don’t talk,” Caros told Bleacher Report. “We don’t talk and we let things build up, and here we are.”
“I agree this is extreme, but I’m the king of things getting out of hand,” added Ben, who professionally goes as Phoenix Jones after making national headlines for fighting crime as a "superhero." "Someone broke into my car so I bought a $10,000 suit to track down and beat up 250 criminals. I'm an escalator. I'm the king of driving things out of control. You should know that if you're my brother."
There isn’t one single incident that led to this, the two say. Instead, it’s simply a lifetime of confrontation and conflict coming to a boil, leading to World Series of Fighting 32 in their home state of Washington on Saturday night. The fight airs on NBC Sports Network.
And even though Ben is the self-proclaimed “king of things getting out of hand,” it was actually Caros that took the initiative to set up the fight.
Despite past declarations that they'd be willing to fight one another dating back several years, the two committed to an uneasy truce up until about a year ago, when Caros traveled to Connecticut to corner Ben in his bout with Emmanuel Walo. Shortly after that, Caros said things started to spiral downward, and while both sides declined to discuss specifics, citing “private family stuff,” the two let their anger for each other stew.
Finally, when Caros heard WSOF was coming to the Fodors' home state of Washington, he reached out to WSOF president Ray Sefo.
Sefo had already picked out opponents for both, but upon hearing Caros’ request to fight his brother, he immediately flashed back to a similar moment in his long and decorated career in combat sports. There was a time when his own brother Rony won a kickboxing title that placed him in a tournament along with Ray. If they both won a couple of rounds, they would be forced to face each other. The possibility alone made him sick, so much so that he basically resolved that if it happened, he would walk into the ring and put his hands down and allow his brother to win. Luckily for them, the bout never materialized. In a way, he hoped the same would happen now, too.
“I told them, ‘I’ll give you guys a couple weeks to think and see if this is really what you want to do,’” he told Bleacher Report. “ But even after that time, it was the same answer.”
Ben said that he had no choice in the matter, that Caros’ was essentially throwing down the gauntlet and refusing would have been accepting a slap in the face, something he would never do.
“He did it for one paycheck, and I mean one, because he’s not getting a win bonus,” he said. “If that’s what you’re willing to trade me for, f--k you.”
The fight between them—Ben (6-1-1) is a natural welterweight and Caros (10-5) is a natural lightweight—will take place at a 162-pound catchweight.
The seeds of this all are far from an MMA cage. Both Ben and Caros were adopted into a large family, and though both say they were lucky to find themselves taken into a loving home, the scars of being surrendered by your birth parents always remain.
Even as kids, their wildly diverging personalities led to constant tension. While Ben is outgoing and at times over the top, Caros is introverted and averse to attention. Still, as the brothers grew up, there seemed to be the potential for harmony.
At age 12, Caros made up his mind that he wanted to be a Marine, and he made good on the promise after graduating high school, joining the Corps. The distance between them helped Ben realize his affection for his brother. When Caros returned from his service—including a tour in Iraq—he needed an adrenaline replacement, and that ultimately led him to mixed martial arts. Ben soon followed, though to put the Fodor conflict stamp on it, he joined a different gym.
“Pretty much the best part of our relationship was after we got into MMA,” Caros said. “It was like the first thing we ever had in common that we could share conversations about. Nothing was more exciting to me than to go to his fights.”
But their relationship has always worked in waves; the crash was coming.
The particulars remain private, but the tension swelled. There was a time when the two were working at the same foster home, one that Caros estimates at 600 square feet. After getting into an argument, they went weeks there without saying a word to each other. They more recently showed up at their mom's house at the same time; the standoff lasted just a few minutes before Caros left.
Those instances pale in comparison to the bouts of violence the two have engaged him, but in some ways are harder on the psyche. A momentary physical fight just requires one burst of emotion; a sustained emotional battle is a test of wills.
Even this contracted fight has had its share of bumps in the road.
For one, the family has been dragged into it, but most have opted out of paying any attention at all, doing their best to ignore the public escalation of a family feud.
For another, shortly after the fight was signed, Ben, who in the recent past had been training alongside Caros at AMC Pankration & Kickboxing with renowned coach Matt Hume, said he sent Hume a text about training and received a reply that he would have to find a new gym for this camp. Ben says that Hume left the door open to return afterward, but the scramble was on.
While Ben claims that Caros put Hume up to it, Caros denies that charge.
“Matt made the decision,” Ben said. “Anyway, Caros doesn’t really come in to train. He comes in to get in shape.”
It was then that Sefo stepped in, made some calls and found a nearby gym—Catalyst MMA—run by Eddie Grant, who happens to be a past coach of Ben’s.
“It was at a point where I wasn’t sure it was going to happen,” Sefo said. “From Ben’s perspective, it’s just a fight. But from Caros’ perspective, it’s a little more personal. So it got a little bit complicated.”
Regardless of the result on Saturday, things between the two may stay that way.
Both brothers are remarkably candid regarding their skill sets and shortcomings. Caros, three inches smaller at 5'9", believes he’s the better all-around fighter but that Ben wields greater power and the ability to rise to the occasion. Ben admits Caros is technically superior but thinks the natural introvert will shrink under the pressure.
“I’m a different kind of dude,” Ben said. “He’ll win most of the fight but I know for a fact there will be a moment where he’ll make a mistake, and I’m a better car. He’s a Mazda and I’m a Ferrari. When he makes a mistake, I’ll pull away.”
“Skill-wise I should literally walk through him,” Caros countered. “The problem is he’s really good on game day. Some guys dig a little deeper, and that’s him. Athletically, he’s a monster. But skill-wise, I should beat him everywhere.”
At least in the practice room, both brothers admit that’s how it’s gone. Caros has sharper technique and more experience. But Ben says it’s not a meaningful simulation because he has never really been able to open up with his power in such instances.
That will change Saturday. Everything else might change, too. But how? How will it all end? What would be the perfect conclusion to this brotherly feud?
For the record, Caros still holds out hope it somehow ends well. He says he’d be able to get over a loss, but that Ben couldn’t handle losing to his arch-rival.
“I’m really pissed at him but I love him,” Caros said. “I really don't know how he f-----g feels. I have questions in my mind like, ‘Does he even care, ever?’ He can be a pretty selfish person. So I’m planning in my mind the possibility for us ... I’m not planning for us to make amends. If anything, this is probably going to push us further over the edge of never talking.”
Ben doesn’t dispute that, and says Caros’ feelings may be his downfall. He says that Caros may have conflict roiling below, and that if it manifests itself in hesitation, he’ll be waiting to take advantage of the situation by whatever means necessary.
And yes, if he loses, he thinks he will have a hell of a time moving past that.
“I’m still in the middle of my emotional anger,” he said, “so if I lose, I can’t say how I’ll feel about myself or about anything, but I know it’ll be his fault for putting me here, so I will hate him until I die.”
Yikes.
For now, neither admits to any regrets. Neither says the process has been therapeutic. There are simply too many untangled layers of pain to look for a peaceful future resolution.
Perhaps the best-case scenario is one offered by Sefo, who said this would be one of the rare times in his role as a promoter when he would gladly accept a draw. Of course, such a result would immediately trigger thoughts of a possibility that might occur anyway with the Fodors, whether in or out of the cage: a rematch.
“S--t,” sighed a dejected Sefo. “I sure hope not.”
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