Jason “The Hitman” Brilz (18-2-1) will make his fifth Octagon appearance this Saturday night as the takes on Brazilian superstar and top ten ranked light heavyweight Antonio Rogerio “Minotoro” Nogueira (18-3) at “UFC 114: Rampage vs. Evans“. Brilz answered the call to fill in for Forrest Griffin, who was originally scheduled to fight Nogueira, but had to pull out due to injury.
It will be the biggest test of Brilz’s ten year professional MMA career. Nogueira has fought many of the biggest names in the game, and holds wins over such fighters as Dan Henderson, Alistair Overeem (twice), Guy Mezger, Vladimir Matyushenko, Kazushi Sakuraba, and most recently, Luis Cane at UFC 106.
ProMMAnow.com spoke to Brilz on Thursday about taking the fight against “Little Nog” and what it means for him. He talked about how he matches up Nogueira, and what sort of strategy he plans to use. Brilz filled us in on where and who he trains with in Omaha and talked about having the support of his fellow firefighters.
“Brilz vs. Nogueira” really is an interesting style match-up, and both fighters have a lot on the line here. This could be a breakthrough fight for Brilz to start getting his name close to some top ten talks. And for Nogueira, who is riding a six-fight win streak, he needs to keep his momentum going to set up a light heavyweight title shot.