Tyson Griffin decided to become a fighter while sitting in the emergency room waiting to get stitched up. A knee from Dave Terrell opened two gashes over his left eye. It was Tyson’s first day training at the Caesar Gracie Academy. Before that Tyson didn’t have much a plan in life. Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, he was a standout wrestler in high school. He was named one of the top 100 athletes in the Contra Costa Times in 2002. He wrestled at Santa Rosa Junior College before dropping out and working construction.

Tyson heard about Dave Terrell’s NorCal Fighting Alliance from some of the other wrestlers at Santa Rosa. So he headed over and started wrestling at the school. After getting submitted a couple of times he started training jiu jitsu. Not long after Dave invited Tyson to learn MMA at Caesar’s.

The first training session at the Caesar Gracie Academy saw Tyson training with Nick and Nate Diaz, Jake Shields, Gilbert Melendez, Gil Castillo and Dave Terrell. Tyson was instantly hooked. Despite being busted open above his eye.

Knowing that making a career in MMA is what he wanted to do, Tyson spent a year training at Caesar’s before taking his first fight. A guy named Tom Call helped Tyson line up his first fight. It went down in Colusa, California for Gladiator Challenge. Tyson was more anxious than nervous that day. He’d spent a year training for the fight and had been held back a few times by opponents dropping out of fights. He looked across the cage and saw his opponent trying to look mean. Tyson smiled at him and ruined his frown. At that point Tyson knew he had a win coming. He stopped Ryan Frost at 1:16 of the first round winning the fight by TKO.

Tyson’s mom supported him for his year of training leading up to his Galdiator Challenge debut. But after that he had to get a job. He took another construction gig, then quit that to work at a flower stand at Costco before going back to construction. Tyson would run on his lunch breaks then train at night after working all day. He fought eight times in his first two years in MMA. Winning with every trip to the cage. His exploits caught the attention of PRIDE and Strikeforce. Tyson began negotiating with both organizations. Then the UFC called. Tyson decided to stay in the States where he could continue fighting in front of family and friends.

Tyson’s first UFC fight came on the UFC 63 (Hughes vs Penn II) undercard. He dispatched David Lee in under two minutes by Rear Naked Choke. Tyson says he was less nervous for that fight than he was fighting Duane Ludwig or fighting in Guam. The reason he says is because he cornered Dave Terrell in the same venue (The Arrowhead Pond). That allowed him to get a sense for the live crowd at a UFC event. A crowd that is like nothing else.

Dave Terrell also brought Tyson to Vegas to train for the first time. They went to the Xyience center as Terrell got ready for Scott Smith and Tyson was gearing up for Krazy Horse Bennett (who later dropped out of the fight resulting in Tyson fighting Chuck Kim). That’s where Tyson met Mike Pyle, Jay Hieron, Gray Maynard and Team Couture boxing coach Ron Frazier. Tyson took an instant liking to the guys. So he came back out to train with them a second time before fighting Duane Ludwig. He stayed with a buddy named Dave Mitchell at his Kickboxing coach’s house. He made the trip from the Bay Area to Vegas a third time while getting ready for his UFC debut against David Lee. After the fight Tyson realized Las Vegas would be a better and more professional environment for his career. So he used his “Submission of the Night” bonus from the David Lee fight to move to Sin City. At the same time Team Couture was forming at the newly opened Xtreme Couture MMA Center. Tyson became an original member of the squad.

These days Tyson trains like a beast with his teammates. He also teaches Muay Thai classes at Xtreme Coutre. He’s waiting to fight against someone in the top 10 of the UFC’s Lightweight division so he can claw his way to a title fight.