Johny Hendricks caught a bit of static following his unanimous decision victory over Matt Brown at UFC 185 back in March. That said, the former welterweight champion isn’t going to allow criticism to sway the way he aims to get the job done inside the Octagon.
Despite backlash from UFC brass and the MMA community in general for the game plan he used to defeat “The Immortal” in Dallas, the 31-year-old Oklahoma native has shrugged off any criticism surrounding the fight. Where the former two-time NCAA Division I national champion wrestler had fallen into a pattern over a lengthy run of fights where he used the power in his hands to obtain victory, Hendricks employed his wrestling savvy at a high rate against Brown to pick up the lopsided win on the judges’ scorecards.
“It felt great to get that last win,” Hendricks told Bleacher Report. “[Matt] Brown is a tough dude. He really is. He’s been in there with some of the best and he always ends up finishing the fight. I knew that going in and that’s why I went a different route. Once I got the first takedown it felt good to stay on top of someone rather than letting them back up. I scored some points there and that’s always a confidence booster. And you have to look at things like that. It was great to fight a tough guy in Dallas and walk out with the win.”
And fight fans should get used to seeing that version of “Bigg Rigg” inside the cage because the Team Takedown leader plans to use his most dominant skill much more going forward. He’s going to pursue victory by any means necessary, and if that happens to disappoint a few people along the way, then so be it. Hendricks is determined to reclaim the welterweight title, and he knows his wrestling skills present a huge problem for anyone he faces inside the cage.
“I want to put on a show for the fans but I also have to win,” Hendricks said. “Look where that got me. You end up putting on a show for the fans but you end up losing. I am definitely going to get back to my strong points and give myself the best chance to win. It also mixes things up because it makes me unpredictable. Then you can actually throw harder and get people to be more offensive and get them to worry about certain things. I think it’s going to play into my game really well.
“I know I fought a great fight and I take it as that,” he added. “The fans can be very hard to please sometimes. There are times where you just have to sit there and accept that. Maybe I can mix things up better in my next fight because you have to constantly adapt. Can’t just sit there and decide to be a striker because I fell into that. I was just striking out there and I was out-pointing everyone, but sometimes you don’t get the win fighting that way. When you can hold someone down and punch them a bunch it’s definitely a great thing to have under your belt.”
While his win over Brown definitely put Hendricks back into the title contention mix in the welterweight division, it wasn’t a concrete bid for another championship opportunity. The heavy-handed Texas transplant lost the strap after being edged out by Robbie Lawler in their rematch at UFC 181 back in December, and “Ruthless” is set to square off with Rory MacDonald at UFC 189 on July 11 in Las Vegas.
That leaves a bit of time for Hendricks to see how things play out, and the championship tilt could very well be the key factor to whether he decides to take another fight in the interim. In a division as talent-rich as the 170-pound collective, things can shift quickly, and Hendricks is all too familiar with how things can unfold when there are so many moving parts at play. Therefore he is going to keep a close eye on the divisional picture and make sure his next step is a precise and calculated move to get him back into a title opportunity.
“I want to see what is going to happen with this fight in July, then we’ll see where I lay,” Hendricks said. “We have talked about it and I might take a fight and I might not. We are still weighing things out. We are going to see where I fall, but right now I see myself as the No. 1 contender. I took a fight and, guess what? It took a belt away from me. It took a belt opportunity away from me. I had a shot at the belt and Rory MacDonald had a fight, and I didn’t want one of them to jump over me so I took a fight. That fight ended up not happening and it cost me a title shot.”
Duane Finley is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report. All quotes are obtained firsthand unless noted otherwise.
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