Stipe Miocic Isn’t Worrying About Anything But Gabriel Gonzaga
(Miocic battles a hungry homeless man for the last burger at UFC 161 photo credit Tom Szczerbowski-USA TODAY Sports)
Stipe Miocic will square off against Gabriel Gonzaga on this Saturday’s UFC on Fox 10 card, and the stakes have never been higher for the Croatian Heavyweight. Currently ranked as the number eight on the official rankings, Miocic has a chance to break in to the top five with a win over ‘Napao’.
Gonzaga is rejuvenated at Heavyweight since his KO loss to Travis Browne, scoring brutal first round knockouts of his own over Dave Herman and Shawn Jordan. 4-1 in his last five and ranked at number 12, Gonzaga is Miocic’s biggest test to date. The Ohio native stopped by to talk with Yahoo Sports about his upcoming scrap with the Brazilian grappler:
“The mistake I don’t want to make is worrying about anything other than Gabriel Gonzaga,” Miocic said. “That’s more than enough for me to be concerned about now If you guys [in the media] want to speculate, that’s up to you. But this is the only fight I’m thinking about.”
Gonzaga has reinvented himself since being cut by the UFC back in 2010, and the result is a submission artist with very dangerous striking abilities. ‘Napao’ had served in the UFC between 2005-10, before being cut on the back of two straight losses. After one fight outside the promotion Gonzaga was back on track with a UFC 142 win over Ednaldo Oliveira.
Miocic met the first loss of his career when he got TKO’d by Stefan Struve in 2012, but looked good when beating the snot out of the walrus Roy Nelson for three rounds at 161. If the heavy-handed Miocic that was wrecking fools up until 2012 shows up, we could be in for a real barn burner.
Something tells me that Gonzaga isn’t going to want any of Miocic’s striking game, but this may be bad news for the Croatian sensation as Gonzaga is a 4th degree black belt in BJJ. Only time will tell if the Ohioan Firefighter can go to the next level, or if the reinvented Brazilian will claim another big scalp.
GIF courtesy of Zombie Prophet
