Cory Sandhagen isn’t paying any consideration to the narrative that he’s a heavy underdog with little likelihood to tug off the upset to beat incumbent bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili after they conflict at UFC 320 in October.
Now Dvalishvili has earned a fame as one of many hardest matchups on the complete UFC roster for a number of causes, not the least of which is his seemingly limitless conditioning the place he can mash down on the gasoline pedal for 25 consecutive minutes with out ever slowing down. Mix that together with his wrestling, and an ever-improving floor recreation, and Dvalishvili is a puzzle nobody has been capable of resolve for the previous seven-plus years.
Whereas Sandhagen definitely gained’t underestimate Dvalishvili going into the combat, he additionally is aware of he can’t pay an excessive amount of consideration to all of the noise if he plans on successful and changing into champion.
“I’m not going to purchase into any of the narrative that Merab’s this cardio machine,” Sandhagen informed MMA Preventing. “That he’s this unbeatable man. That he’s on a tear and may’t be stopped.
“I’m not shopping for into any of that. I absolutely plan on going out and beating Merab and carrying gold on my waist. That’s all that I do know in my coronary heart.”
Now make no mistake, Sandhagen doesn’t count on to simply stroll into the octagon and dispatch Dvalishvili in simple vogue to win the UFC bantamweight title.
In actual fact, he’s getting ready for absolutely the worst-case state of affairs as a result of that’s the place it appears lots of Dvalishvili’s previous opponents have come up brief. Sandhagen says Dvalishvili’s potential to push the tempo is likely to be one in all his best-known weapons, however it’s removed from his solely strategy to win a combat.
“Our our bodies don’t do this good once we get drained,” Sandhagen defined. “We don’t make pretty much as good of choices and we don’t get to maneuver as fast and have pretty much as good reactions once we are somewhat bit fatigued or a variety of it fatigued. Merab pulls individuals into that, in fact, however even within the earlier ways in which he fights, it’s very mentally stimulating. Actually much like the way in which that I combat, too. It’s all the time one thing occurring that the opposite individual must be reacting to. I feel that’s what Merab does rather well on the technical [side], not simply him being a freak cardio man.
“He’s a really centered and engaged fighter. If you’re combating somebody for 25 minutes and so they’re partaking the complete time and they’re pulling you into deep waters and getting you drained. That’s a ache within the ass. That’s what I do to lots of people, too. I’ve been already sort of working that.”
Sandhagen believes an enormous key to not solely surviving a combat towards Dvalishvili however giving himself the perfect likelihood to win just isn’t permitting the Georgian to dictate the tempo.
Finest recognized for consistently urgent ahead, searching for takedowns and simply outworking his opponents, Dvalishvili has an uncanny potential to successfully drive fighters to play his recreation and react to no matter he’s doing.
If he desires to develop into champion, Sandhagen is aware of he can’t enable that to occur.
“I feel a serious key element to combating Merab goes to be to make it possible for I’m the one main the dance,” Sandhagen mentioned. “I’m ensuring that I can mentally sustain with the tempo that that’s going to be, after which additionally mentally sustain once I do get drained, as a result of everybody will get drained in fights. Simply ensuring that my mind is sweet, and my mind can deal with Merab for 25 minutes is sort of the important thing.
“As a result of technically and scary smart, he’s a brilliant phenomenal wrestler. You may’t take that away from him. Clearly now he’s a submission risk, too. However exterior of that, he’s not essentially the most harmful man on this planet. So simply ensuring that I’m prepared for the takedowns and the submissions and staying centered and ensuring that I’m main the dance and never Merab.”
There have been loads of feared champions previously with names like Anderson Silva and Jon Jones on the high of the record on the subject of fighters who nearly intimidated opponents earlier than ever setting foot within the octagon with them.
Dvalishvili won’t carry that very same sort of aura simply but, however he positively presents a problem that has exhausted and consumed so many fighters attempting to determine a strategy to beat him.
“If you combat a man like Merab, combating drained simply isn’t very enjoyable,” Sandhagen mentioned. “You are able to do it however it’s simply not very best, particularly for a really athletic man like [Sean] O’Malley. I feel that Umar [Nurmagomedov] did an excellent job of being ‘I’m about to defend these photographs, we are able to wrestle, we are able to wrestle, bitch.’ There’s that angle moving into to combat a wrestler after which there’s a [mentality] like ‘oh man, I need to hold out of the wrestling exchanges and stuff like that.’ I sort of made that mistake towards Umar, too, the place I ran from the wrestling exchanges somewhat bit an excessive amount of, and I made it so amongst different issues, I couldn’t do what I often do.
“So I realized from that combat large time that that’s not the way in which to strategy somebody that’s a very good grappler and goes to make you’re employed for stuff. You sort of simply need to [concede] all proper bitch, that is what we’re doing and be OK with that and settle for that. That makes it rather a lot simpler.”
With the combat two months away, Sandhagen has that a lot time to make sure that he leaves no stone unturned on the subject of his preparation to beat Dvalishvili. He’s not providing up a prediction simply but, however Sandhagen is assured that he’ll shock the world and stroll out of UFC 320 with a title belt round his waist.
“I feel that I’ll in all probability shock lots of people with the way in which that I’ll combat Merab,” Sandhagen mentioned. “I’m excited for that.”
