The Forgotten Greatest MMA Fighter in the World is Fighting Tonight

In the world of Mixed Martial Arts the UFC is by and large the dominant promotion. They have a Band-Aid like name recognition where it's assumed that UFC and MMA are more or less the same thing. This is far from the truth though, and you’ll be able to see soon on network television what I’m saying when Asian MMA promotion ONE FC premieres on TNT.

That’s right, tonight April 7th a completely different MMA promotion with a different production style is playing on American televisions. First of all, scoring is different. Judges award wins based on the totality of the fight and who won it as a whole rather than who was able to cheese their way through stealing rounds with non damaging take downs. Striking is a little different, fighters can knee and kick downed opponents which you can’t do in the UFC and opens up a plethora of opportunities fighters normally can’t capitalize on. What’s most important about watching ONE is watching arguably the best MMA fighter in the world, Demetrious Johnson.

Johnson is a pretty unrecognizable and unpopular name but he is one of the best fighters in history. He formerly fought in the UFC until he was traded for Ben Askren who didn’t do a lot of winning but definitely captured people’s attention. When Johnson did fight in the UFC he was nothing less than spectacular. He was someone with virtually no holes, no weaknesses, and a master in virtually all aspects of fighting. He’s done it all: one punch knockouts, a submission in the last second of a champion fight, and general domination. He set the record for title defenses in the UFC and his only losses were to Dominick Cruz when he went up a weight class and when he dropped a very controversial split decision to multi-divisional champ and Olympic medalist Henry Cejudo. I mean did THIS.

Johnson never found much in the way of notoriety or popularity in the UFC. He’s 5’3 and has the personality of a cardboard box. This is all very unfortunate because newer UFC fans missed out on arguably the greatest MMA fighter ever and now that he fights for an Asian promotion it’s harder for new fans to watch him. If you consider yourself a fight fan, don’t miss out on seeing DJ go to work, it doesn’t come around often.