In the world of mixed martial arts, Ben Askren was a force of nature. An Olympic wrestler with an unbreakable will, his entire career was built on a simple principle: get ahold of your opponent and impose your will until they break. He could control the chaos, dictate the pace, and wrestle even the most dangerous fighters into submission.
But in the summer of 2025, the decorated fighter came up against an opponent he couldn’t see, couldn’t grab, and couldn’t pin down. It was a battle not for a belt, but for his life, and it proved to be the toughest fight of his career.
The Fight Begins Within
The opponent wasn’t another fighter. It was a staph infection.
What started as a seemingly manageable issue quickly spiraled into a life-threatening crisis. The infection triggered a severe case of pneumonia, and Askren’s body, honed by decades of elite athletic competition, began to fail. His lungs, the engine for any fighter, gave out.
He was rushed to the hospital, where his condition deteriorated rapidly. Doctors were forced to take extreme measures. First a ventilator, then an ECMO machine—a form of advanced life support that does the work of the heart and lungs. He was in a coma for about 45 days, his life hanging in the balance.
A Battle on the Brink
During this harrowing period in the ICU, Ben Askren’s heart stopped four times. He flatlined, brought back from the brink each time by the medical team fighting for him. The man who had built a reputation on his relentless pace and unbreakable cardio was now completely reliant on machines to breathe and circulate his blood.
The infection had caused irreversible damage. The only option left was a drastic one: a double lung transplant.
At the end of June 2025, Askren underwent the transplant surgery. After 59 days of fighting an invisible enemy, he was finally released from the hospital in late July, having won the most important bout of his life.
The Long Road to Recovery
The victory came at a great cost. Askren lost around 50 pounds and faced a new challenge: learning to live again. The Olympian and world-class fighter had to relearn basic functions, including how to walk. His ongoing recovery is a testament to the same discipline and grit that defined his career in the cage.
In a surprising turn, the often-divisive world of combat sports rallied around him. Figures like UFC president Dana White and one-time boxing rival Jake Paul offered significant financial support, proving that some fights transcend sport.
Ben Askren’s story is a stark reminder that the toughest opponents are often the ones we can’t see. He spent a career wrestling men, only to find his greatest challenge in a fight against his own body. His legacy will not only be as the “Funky” wrestler who dominated the cage, but as the fighter who stared down death and refused to tap out.
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