Demetrious Johnson talks about his phenomenal submission and where it came from
Demetrious Johnson made history over the weekend and did it with an excalamation point.
“Mighty Mouse” set the record at UFC 216 for the most consecutuve UFC title defenses in history with 11, surpassing Anderson Silva’s record. Johnson showed the world his dominance over his opponent Ray Borg and put the icing on the cake in the fifth and final round, pulling off an insane transition from a suplex straight into an armbar.
“It’s always been in my back pocket, in my toolbox, but I never try to force submissions,” Johnson said on Monday’s episode of The MMA Hour (transcribed by Shaun Al-Shatti for MMA Fighting). “When you start trying to force things, that’s when you over-extend, you make mistakes. And so for that, it was just the perfect timing, man.
“(Head coach) Matt (Hume) has been working with me on shifting people’s weights when they’re trying to be heavy. And then once Ray Borg threw that back elbow, he took his weight off, he went to focus on planting, so I purposefully started kneeing him in the legs, just getting his mind on something else. So once he goes, ‘back elbow,’ thank you, you just moved your weight for me, now you just became lighter. Then threw him up and that’s why I was able to execute that.”
While many were blown away to see Johnson’s insane technique pulled off in the title fight, the UFC’s pound-for-pound champ said that he has been perfecting the move in training for years and just capitalized on the perfect opportunity to pull it off. In doing so, “Mighty Mouse” cemented his place in the history books where he is extremely proud to be.
“So this is a big f*cking deal and it means a lot to me,” Johnson said of his title defenses while noting that no other fighter in any other notable MMA promotion has gone to defend a title even eight times aside from Silva.
“For me, I just like to be able to have my name above all the other champions. I mean, we’ve had some great champions. Anderson, GSP, Jon Jones, Daniel Cormier, Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Ronda Rousey, Conor McGregor, and we all offer something totally different to the table as a champion. But for me, to bring consistency as a champion, pass all my drug tests as a champion, probably one of the easiest champions to work with in the UFC — that goes a long way in my book. So I’m happy.”
on 10/10/2017.
This article appeared first on BJPENN.COM
Topics:
Demetrious Johnson Ray Borg Videos
