ONE Championship’s Demetrious Johnson on lingering UFC call-outs – ‘they’re building my brand’
- ‘Mighty Mouse’ says ‘I don’t think anything of it’ when UFC stars like new flyweight champ Deiveson Figueiredo bring up his name
- Johnson says former rival Henry Cejudo would ‘fit well’ in ONE but jokes ‘recreational drugs … are not allowed in Japan and Singapore’
Monday marked two years to the day that Demetrious Johnson last fought in the UFC. But his name still comes up whenever the 125-pound division is the centre of attention.
Even after being traded in 2018 to ONE Championship and capturing the ONE flyweight grand prix belt last October in Tokyo, “Mighty Mouse” (27-3-1) is ever the talk of the town on his old stamping grounds.
The latest to call his name out? Deiveson Figueiredo, who last month became just the third UFC flyweight title-holder in the belt’s eight-year existence, which shows Johnson’s sheer dominance of the division. The American held the title for 2,142 days, and made a record 11 title defences, before that razor-thin split decision loss to Henry Cejudo on August 4, 2018.
“That’s definitely a fight that all the fans would want to see – me against Demetrious Johnson,” Figueiredo said. “But if the UFC wants to bring him back, I’m going to be very happy. I’m going to knock him out and with a lot of pride, and I’m very happy to do that.”
“I don’t think anything of it,” Johnson told SCMP MMA of the lingering call-outs. “If they want to mention my name, they can mention my name. That’s how I think of it. I think of it as them building my brand.