One Championship: Demetrious Johnson loves fighting in morning – ‘it’s way better, sign me up any time’
- ‘Mighty Mouse’ wins flyweight grand prix in Tokyo, after heading to the cage before midday
- ‘I wanna do this every single time they cater to TNT and everybody in the USA’
Fighting in the morning was certainly an alien concept for Demetrious Johnson. But “Mighty Mouse” is down for doing it again, any time.
The former UFC star capped off a successful 2019 by winning the One Championship flyweight grand prix final, beating Danny Kingad, of the Philippines, in the final.
The bout was the co-main event of One’s Century Part 1 card – which began at 9am local time at the famed Sumo Hall in Ryogoku, to fit into a prime time slot on US television network TNT.
“Sign me up! Any given time, I’ll fight any time in the morning, it’s way better for my body,” Johnson said the post-event press conference.
“The hardest thing that I feel I have adjusting to the time zone is fighting at night. You know, I give myself 10 days to come out here. Then wake up in the morning, then having to fill your day up with media and all the obligations.
“Then after you’re done, I gotta jump on the train and then go train. And then, you get done training about 10 o’clock at night and you’ve gotta find some food, hopefully something’s open. And about time you get done eating it’s 11pm at night, and then you gotta try to get to sleep.”
Demetrious Johnson dominates Danny Kingad in flyweight grand prix final
Johnson dispatched Kingad with relative ease, setting up a title shot against flyweight champion Adriano Moraes – and he’ll probably be lobbying One CEO Chatri Sityodtong for another AM slot.
“This morning card is a lot better, I wanna do this every single time they cater to TNT and everybody in the USA,” he added.
“I appreciate it, thank you Chatri for making it happen, thank you TNT for making it happen. And yeah, sign me up.”
