Tyron Woodley has been very open about his belief that Kamaru Usman has no path to victory ahead of their co-main event tomorrow night at UFC 235. Tyron Woodley has constantly made the argument that skill for skill, there is no category where Usman outshines him. In a sit-down interview with Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports, Woodley would break down the categories to once again illustrate his point:
“Usman has decent striking. He has good wrestling. But when you think about me, three categories: you have to put excellent,” Woodley said. “He has excellent grappling. He is an excellent striker. He has excellent power. He has excellent takedown defense. So he doesn’t really have anything excellent next to him.”
But Tyron Woodley did give the next challenger for his welterweight championship credit for one thing, and it is an attribute Woodley has been mindful of during training:
“The only thing he has that’s excellent is his composure. He has the composure of somebody that’s been in there a lot. And that’s something that you gotta be mindful of when you’re training for him. He’s not gonna get hit once or twice and just lose his wits…”
Tyron Woodley may not believe that Kamaru Usman has what it takes to outfight him, but he does believe that Usman has what it takes to deceive judges that he is outfighting him, which is why Woodley plans to leave it out of the judges’ hands Saturday night:
“He’s gonna be kind of relaxed. He’s gonna keep his poker face on. Even if I’m outclassing him, he’s gonna act like nothing happened. And that composure can sometimes sway the judges on what’s really taking place in the Octagon, and I know that. So I gotta be ready to put it on him for 25 minutes.”
Do you believe Tyron Woodley vs. Kamaru Usman will go to the judges? If so, what do you expect the scorecard to be? If not, how do you see the fight finishing?
