Demetrious Johnson(left) will face Ian McCall at the UFC on FX 2 event in Australia

The UFC on FX 2 event will feature a flyweight bout between Demetrious Johnson and Ian McCall which is set to take place in Sydney, Australia. The fight is part of a four man tournament which will eventually crown a champion for the newly created UFC flyweight division. The winner of this fight will face the winner of the Joseph Benavidez vs. Yasuhiro Urushitani for the title later this year. Let’s see how this one breaks down.

Demetrious Johnson comes into this fight with a career record of (14-2) with six wins via submission and three via TKO/KO. Johnson was last seen in action losing in his UFC featherweight bantamweight title fight against Dominick Cruz via unanimous decision. Johnson is extremely quick with a good wrestling base, but is also versed in submissions as well as he trains with veteran trainer Matt Hume. The knock on Johnson has always been his size, but that is why this new division was created for small fighters like Johnson.

Ian McCall comes into this fight with a career record of (11-2) with four wins via TKO/KO and three wins via submission. McCall was last seen in action last August defeating Darrell Montague via submission at Tachi Palace Fights 10 to be come the TPF flyweight champion. This will mark McCall’s UFC debut.

Johnson is the favorite at (-320) and McCall as the underdog at (+250).

I think Johnson should be the favorite, but I’m not sure that McCall is that big of an underdog in this fight. I imagine this fight being all over the place at an extremely high fast pace that should wow fans that haven’t seen two elite small guys go at it. I think the best part of Johnson’s game is transitioning from striking to takedowns as his speed is second to none. We’ve seen him have success against the larger guys in the UFC, so I definitely expect those skills to transfer over to this lighter weight class.

Both of these guys have a common opponent is losing to the now current UFC bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz. Johnson lost to Cruz in his last fight with McCall losing to Cruz back in 2009. Cruz is a different fighter nowadays, but it’s interesting that Johnson got the better of Cruz striking wise(or was at least even with him), but had problems stopping the takedowns of Cruz. McCall was able to defend all four takedown attempts from Cruz, but was clearly out struck on the feet. Cruz went for takedowns 19 times against Johnson in their five round affair while only going for four takedowns in his three round fight with McCall. The takedown and transitions as well as the speed of Johnson will be the key to whoever wins this fight.

McCall has very good takedown defense as he has defended 80% of the takedowns against him, but Johnson is a fighter that goes for a ton of takedowns as well landing 65% of his shots according to Fightmetric. If Johnson is able to have success there that could be the difference in this fight. On the flipside, Johnson only defends takedowns at a 47% clip with McCall landing 43% of his takedowns.

If not, it’ll come down to who has the most success in the striking department. Both fighters are very active on the feet throwing over 100 strikes in their three round fights in the past. Johnson will have a two inch reach advantage, but McCall has the better striking defense according to Fightmetric.

I think Johnson has been fighting tougher opposition in his past fights, as well as larger opponents as of late and doing very well againt them. That experience should serve him well going against a fighter making their UFC debut. I think the Johnson takes this fight via unanimous decision. His speed and seamless transitions from striking to wrestling will likely be the difference in this one.

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