Manager sees two key areas where Justin Gaethje can beat Tony Ferguson

Ali Abdelaziz sees two key areas where his client Justin Gaethje can beat Tony Ferguson in their UFC 249 interim title fight.

First, Abdelaziz believes Gaethje’s wrestling could pose problems for Ferguson, who has struggled with high-level wrestlers like Kevin Lee before.

“Tony Ferguson is an unorthodox, crazy fighter who come at you with different angles,” Abdelaziz told ESPN, breaking down the Gaethje vs. Ferguson fight (transcript via South China Morning Post). “He’s a brawler [with an] opportunistic ground game. I’m not gonna say he have very high-level ground game, because we saw what Kevin Lee did to him. He mounted him and he almost took his back.

“But Tony, he hurt you, he catch you with submissions, almost like a catch wrestler,” Abdelaziz continued. “A jiu-jitsu black belt, of course he have great coach like Eddie Bravo. Without him it would be a 50-50 fight. Catch guys with submission, that’s Eddie Bravo’s style. I got to give respect to him, but realistically he’s fighting a guy who’s the best technical brawler we’ve ever seen in the sport.

“I have to remind everybody this guy [Gaethje] is a Division 1 All American wrestler. It’s a great fight for the fans, it’s gonna be chaos. Justin Gaethje is ready to die in there. Is Tony? Normally he is. We’re gonna see how deep he can dig, and Justin.”

Abdelaziz also feels that Justin Gaethje has a major power edge over Ferguson. That power, the manager reminds, was on full display in Gaethje’s recent knockouts of James Vick, Edson Barboza and Donald Cerrone.

“It’s such a great fight stylistically,” Abdelaziz said. “I think the last three fights we saw Justin switch a little bit. Trevor Wittman is one of the best coaches we’ve ever seen in the sport. He studies guys.

“Last three fights, three knockouts in less than five minutes, Justin didn’t take any damage. I wanna see how Tony can take damage. Justin doesn’t hit like Kevin Lee, Anthony Pettis, these people. When Justin hits you, he can put people to sleep. I wanna know how hard he can take Justin’s hit, because Justin is gonna hit him. I wanna know his recovery.”

Who do you think will come out on top when Justin Gaethje and Tony Ferguson collide at UFC 249?

This article first appeared on BJPENN.com on 4/23/2020.