Demetrious Johnson may be the fastest man in the UFC, but that doesn’t mean the flyweight champion is exciting fans with his agility-based style.
But is the flyweight champion “boring?”
That’s what challenger John Moraga thinks, telling MMA Fighting that while he doesn’t have any disrespect for “Mighty Mouse” or his skills, he runs away more than he fights.
In fact, Moraga says Johnson isn’t even as quick as people think:
“He just bounces around. He runs around too much. He don’t fight,” Moraga said during a recent interview. “He don’t put on exciting fights. He’s got a lot of technique and skill, but he doesn’t go in there and try to finish people, I don’t feel.”
“My main thing is I don’t want to go out there and put on boring fights. For this fight, who knows how it’s going to play out? Once we get in there, we’ll adapt to whatever we need to. I know I’m going to have be a little bit patient because he moves around so much and doesn’t get the fight going right away as far as big, heavy exchanges or anything like that.”
Moraga is far from the only person to criticize Johnson for his perceived volume-heavy, low-power style, with UFC president Dana White having to bat for his champion on several occasions.
MMA fans were especially critical of Johnson’s title victory against Joseph Benavidez last September, prompting White to say anyone who hated that fight should never buy a UFC pay-per-view ever again, according to MMA Weekly.
However, fans may just not like flyweight bouts.
Even UFC on FX 5 saw plenty of boos during the John Dodson vs. Jussier da Silva bout, and although the jeers stopped shortly before Dodson’s KO finish, an exasperated White, according to MMA Mania, could only guess that fans would “get 10-12 beers in them” and expect too much.
But maybe Moraga will bring in the cheers next time—he’s finished both of his UFC bouts so far and even earned a “Submission of the Night” bonus in his last outing.
Regardless, both men will need to perform on July 27, 2013, at UFC on Fox 8 in the Seattle Key Arena, with their UFC Flyweight Championship bout headlining a stacked main card.
McKinley Noble is an MMA conspiracy theorist. His work has appeared in NVision, PC World, Macworld, GamePro, 1UP, MMA Mania and The L.A. Times.
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