This morning, Tony Ferguson did not live up to the expectations of the fans and lost the temporary championship to Justin Gaethje. Is there any explanation for his unfortunate defeat?
Hailed as the rival of defending champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, recently, Tony Ferguson was eliminated from the race due to his loss to Justin Gaethje. Before the unfortunate loss of TKO, some pouted, some sympathized for a brave “Bug” but not met Tony Ferguson. So what is the reason why Tony Ferguson showed such a weak performance despite having been considered as a counterpart to Khabib?
Change in training plan
Before the outbreak of COVID-19, Tony Ferguson’s primary concern was the tireless wrestling machine Khabib Nurmagomedov. Everything was supposed to be Tony vs Khabib but then the “Russian Eagle” could not stand out because of the epidemic and Justin Gaethje became the replacement.
Contrary to Khabib, Justin is a genuine striker with a crazy frenzy. One of the main factors creating the craziness is that Justin’s weak eyesight makes it nearly impossible to see the opponent without a “touch”. However, since eye surgery, Justin Gaethje has gradually reshaped the fighting style at UFC. For a newly added person like Gaethje, Gaethje’s pace of change will go very fast and very much after each game, and this is the change that Tony Ferguson is unpredictable first.
Thus, in addition to the physical foundation that has been prepared from the beginning, all of Tony’s optimization plans are not aimed at Justin but only around Khabib. Meanwhile, in Justin, although he had to play in a relatively tight position, but inadvertently, he had the opportunity to choose the optimal plan to confront Tony Ferguson.
One side is a temporary champion to “rebuild” both tactics, techniques, physical strength to suit the new opponent, and one is the challenger just need to develop its platform with a little porridge to find out how to play. Evidently, Justin Gaethje received more advantages than Tony Fergusonm, who had just experienced a hard time due to the sudden replacement of the opponent.
If Tony Ferguson is a bizarre fighter who can adapt to any style of play, Justin Gaethje is especially an extremely tough striker. Thus, in order to deal well with Justin, Tony needs to improve striking a lot to find the way to apply BJJ with “The Highlight”.
Because Justin Gaethje is a striking fighter himself, it is almost impossible for Tony Ferguson to overtake rivals on their own ground without any extra skills threatening “The Highlight”. Feasibility. Justin Gaethje has yet another advantage over Tony Ferguson.
It is true that in martial arts, anything is possible. Tony Ferguson has lost and cannot give any plausible defense. All that was left was a sigh: “If only …” then Tony Ferguson was able to confront Khabib Nurmagomedov in the expectation of everyone.
