Plenty of people, myself included, believe that Ian McCall will beat Demetrious Johnson tonight.
It’s a sound prediction, at least in my head. I think McCall did enough to beat Johnson the first time around. He did more damage, and if not for a few moments when he decided to showboat instead of going for the finish, he may have scored an outright judges decision instead of the marred non-draw he was forced to settle for.
And then there is this: just hours after weighing in at 126 pounds during yesterday’s weigh-ins, McCall posted on the Underground that he weighed in at 150.5 pounds.
I just stepped on the scale at 150.5 with sweats and a shirt on.. i’d say i gained a few lbs since the weigh ins hahaha!
Yes, McCall gained 25 pounds in just a few hours. That’s a lot of weight.
If McCall’s story is true—and we have no reason not to believe him—McCall will have a significant size advantage over Johnson going into the fight. I don’t believe Johnson ever gets larger than 150 pounds or so, and that’s when he’s out of training camp. There’s no way he’ll put that much weight back on before he steps in the cage with McCall tonight.
All of this just solidifies my prediction for the main event tonight: I believe McCall will use his wrestling effectively to put Johnson on his back and control the fight from there.
McCall saw, in the first fight with Johnson, that “Mighty Mouse” doesn’t have the best takedown defense. Johnson has defended just 48 percent of takedown attempts since joining the UFC, and that provides a clear path to victory for McCall.
Look for McCall to learn from his mistakes and the areas he succeeded in the first fight and work his way to a decision.
Jeremy Botter is the national UFC blogger for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter for breaking news and hilarious stuff.
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