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Kenny Florian believes Colby Covington will have the slight edge over Kamaru Usman at UFC 245.
Love him or hate him, Colby Covington is a hell of a fighter.
The American Top Team (ATT) standout is on a seven-fight win streak against a who’s who of UFC welterweight contenders and Kenny Florian believes ‘Chaos’s’ frenetic pace could be the difference maker against Kamaru Usman.
Speaking on a recent edition of the Anik & Florian podcast, co-host ‘KenFlo’ said he is ‘leaning towards Covington’ beating current champ Usman to win the welterweight title at UFC 245.
“I think that Usman’s a tremendous fighter but I have a hard time believing that was the best Tyron Woodley out there on fight night,” Florian said, per BJPenn.com. “He didn’t look right mentally, he didn’t look right physically to me. Coming off that surgery, that was not what Tyron Woodley truly offers in a championship fight. Not to take away from Usman’s performance and it was phenomenal, I just think he fought him at the right time and was able to take advantage of that.”
“If you asked me before Colby’s fight against Robbie Lawler who I think would win, I would say Kamaru Usman very confidently,” he continued. “Now I’m leaning towards Colby Covington. I just think that the kind of pace that he put on Robbie Lawler and me expecting him to eventually get tired, and that just never took place. The improvement in his striking was significant enough for me to say that he has better striking than Kamaru Usman. The way that he was putting together the combinations, the way that he looked way more technical. Again, I haven’t seen a performance like that as far as conditioning-wise in a very long time. Khabib will just straight outwrestle you and put out a pace on the ground, but I haven’t seen a pace like that on the feet and on the ground with the wrestling. I was super impressed with Colby Covington’s performance. Hate him or love him, that guy has improved as a martial artist.”
UFC 245 takes place next month, December 14 at T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas. The pay-per-view extravaganza will also feature a co-headlining featherweight title bout between Max Holloway and Alexander Volkanovski, as well as a women’s bantamweight title bout between Amanda Nunes and Germaine de Randamie.