Demetrious Johnson is done listening to MMA’s ‘uneducated fools’

Demetrious Johnson can’t say for sure when, but at some point he just stopped caring. Maybe it was the 400th time he had to answer for the same non-issues that finally did him in. Who knows? Either way, the only flyweight champion the UFC has ever known, the same man who doubles as the most likely inheritor to Anderson Silva’s UFC record treasure trove, is over it.

“At one point in time in my career, it was like, ‘oh, he never finishes nobody.’ Then the next thing you know, I’m breaking peoples’ arms, making them tap out and knocking them out,” Johnson said Thursday on a UFC 191 media conference call. “Then the next thing you know it’s, ‘oh, I don’t like his personality.’ It’s like, okay, well, if you don’t like who I am, I can’t help you there, buddy.

“Landing the latest submission ever in the UFC history, I’m more focused on that and that’s all that matters to me. Going out there and performing, showing that I’m a well-rounded fighter who can strike, grapple, submit, clinch. Everything. You look into an encyclopedia and ask what fighter can do any type of martial art at a high-caliber level, my picture will show up.”

Johnson’s contempt is easy to forgive, considering this has become such a familiar refrain for the uber-talented 29-year-old. Seemingly every time the flyweight king defends his belt, all the hand-wringing over his lack of drawing power somehow pushes its way back to the forefront of the narrative. It’s a curious spectacle simply because it only happens to “Mighty Mouse,” and in a broader sense, the flyweights as a whole.

And it’s even more curious because all that chatter comes mainly from the group that should care about such things the least: the fans. The UFC obviously trusts Johnson enough to keep thrusting him into big spots. His UFC 191 rematch with Dodson will be the seventh straight event Johnson has headlined. The last four of the those have been on pay-per-view, the UFC’s most prized stage, and the three previous were atop big FOX in front of millions.

Johnson’s contemporaries, too, shower him with praise. Conor McGregor has spoken volumes about the high esteem he holds Johnson in, and in a recent Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything), Ronda Rousey avowed Johnson as her favorite male fighter in the UFC. Her reasoning? He’s the most well-rounded fighter around, and he fights so fast that it looks like something straight out of DragonBall Z.

“Well she’s very educated and I’ve got nothing but love for Ronda Rousey,” Johnson said. “And that’s the thing, I’ve never walked across another fighter in the UFC (who had a problem), from heavyweight all the way down to women’s strawweight, middleweight, other champions. I’ve always gotten great praises and I give it back to those guys as well.

“So it’s only the fans and uneducated fools out there who say, ‘oh, you’re boring.’ If you say so, but you just don’t understand what I’m doing. You just don’t understand the positives and the technique that I bring to the table.”

Those who defend Johnson point to the fact that his division isn’t doing him many favors. And it’s true. Joseph Benavidez, the man who was supposed to be Johnson’s equal, forfeited his rematch in two minutes. Ian McCall, the man who nearly stopped Johnson before all of this ever started, can’t even climb back to give himself a third chance. The rest are a hodgepodge of analogous names and voices who Johnson has dispatched with disturbing ease.

So other than point out how good he is — which, by the way, Johnson does all the time — what else can he do without a proper rival to bring out his best?

“Dana White has gone on the record saying it,” Johnson said. “When Anderson Silva first showed up to the UFC, he wasn’t the star he was. It took somebody like Chael Sonnen to come by to make everybody notice. The same thing with Chris Weidman. He really hasn’t taken off until his last fight after he beat Vitor Belfort.”

The only outlier to the whole equation is John Dodson, the ball of furious energy who Johnson meets Sept. 5 at UFC 191. Dodson was seconds away from taking Johnson’s head off when the two first met in 2013, and he’s been jonesing for a shot at redemption ever since. In a weight class rife with cookie-cutter choruses, Dodson has never seen a mic he didn’t enjoy.

So is possible that Dodson is the one who could propel Johnson away from the champion’s never-ending deluge of criticism?

Sure, it’s possible. But then again, what if he’s just like all the others?

“The question I come back to is, what happens after this?” Johnson said. “Regardless of if I lose or if I win, what happens after this? And that’s what I’m always looking forward to in the future. Let’s say I go out there, I put on a spectacular performance and I end up beating John Dodson. People are still going to talk. People are still going to say, ‘ah, well.’

“When I knocked out Joseph Benavidez, one of the comments that made me laugh so hard was: ‘yeah man, I sat there and watched Joseph Benavidez get knocked out by Demetrious Johnson and I just shrugged my shoulders and went out and bought a burrito.’ Okay. That’s good. So like I said, I’m not focused on trying to get the fans’ notoriety and getting them rallied behind me. If you want to see great mixed martial arts, tune in when I fight. If you want to see drama and all of that stuff, you guys can go watch Bachelors in Paradise. They’ll give you enough drama you can want to watch.”