Jon Fitch & Chris Wilson discuss their fight and more.

[Ramma]

"I'll risk getting knocked out to try for a knockout myself," stated debuting UFC welterweight Chris Wilson as he discussed his upcoming clash with Jon Fitch at UFC 82 in Columbus, Ohio. Check out what he had to say about the fight and much more as he's confident that his exciting style could make his fight with Fitch a candidate for fight of the night on a card that's stacked with talent.

PC: How are you doing Chris?

CW: I'm doing well. Just got my medicals and eye exams finished. The blood work should be in shortly.

PC: How's training going for your big fight with Jon Fitch?

CW: I'm feeling confident about the fight and I've been focusing most of my time developing and practicing strategy and working my conditioning rather than trying to learn a bunch of new stuff. I feel great.

PC: Fitch is a very well-rounded fighter. Have you found some big welterweights that can emulate his style in your preparation?

CW: If by "big welterweights" you mean middleweights and light heavyweights, then yes…plenty. Seriously though, nowadays, I try to train with some bigger guys when preparing for a bigger guy like Jon.

PC: We see it happen so often that the big lights of the UFC blind so many fighters. Are you prepared for that not to be a factor for you?

CW: It's hard to say. I don't want to say that it won't affect me because I really just don't know, however, I think I have a couple of things playing to my advantage in dealing with the situation. I've cornered in the UFC before and I know what it looks and feels like to walk out, despite it not having been my fight. Also, although I haven't fought in front of 14,000 people, I have fought in front of 8-9,000 so I know what a big crowd vibe feels like. Not to mention, I'm a huge underdog so that relieves a bit of pressure there too. My biggest pressures are from myself to perform well.

PC: You're on a 4-fight winning streak. What are some of the things you feel you have to do to keep the streak alive?

CW: Win. I need to win to climb the rankings and secure my future with the promotion.

PC: It seems so hard to find a weakness in Fitch's game. You don't have to share what it is, but do you feel like you have found a weakness and is it something you think your style could exploit?

CW: I feel that, like everyone, Fitch has some tendencies that follow him throughout his career.  That's not to say I know what he'll do, but I feel that my awareness and timing will allow me to capitalize on certain things if I execute my gameplan correctly.

PC: You obviously train with some top-notch guys. How much are guys like Lindland and Hendo helping you prepare for this fight?

CW: Coming from a striking background, I really have those guys, along with Ryan Schultz, Robert Follis, Chael Sonnen and Ian Loveland, to thank for my wrestling. They built it from the ground up. I came to TQ with striking and limited ground game. Learning from Lindland and the guys really was the best way to learn. The longer I train with TQ, the better my MMA gets because I'm able to implement my strengths through improving my weaknesses.

PC: What do you think of Jon Fitch as a fighter?

CW: It's funny you would ask. I have a lot of respect for him. He fought his way up and didn't get a lot of credit. Now he's finally getting some much deserved attention. I also like that he doesn't talk trash. I'm not into that either.

PC: How tough mentally is it for you to prepare for a guy on a 14-fight winning streak knowing that he's not used to losing?

CW: His winning streak really doesn't come into play for me. I'm not used to losing either. When you get used to losing, you shouldn't be fighting. Preparing for fights is tough mentally because it's a tough sport and you have to push through barriers to achieve goals. The opponent doesn't really play a role for me. I just prepare as well as possible in the time I have.

PC: Fitch is a great wrestler. Do you think it will benefit you more to keep this fight standing?

CW: It always benefits me more to keep a fight standing. I believe I have a dangerous and deceptive striking game. I feel confident in my clinch and wrestling abilities, but I will probably never make wrestling my first choice, just like Fitch will probably always feel more comfortable wrestling. I hope he comes out and stands and tries to "surprise me."

PC: How big will a win over Jon Fitch be for you?

CW: Undoubtedly, this is a high-profile fight. Beating Fitch will propel me into the rankings. Beating Fitch may not necessarily get me the title shot that they are planning for him, but it will be very difficult to deny me a top 10 spot after I win.

PC: How do you see this fight going and do you predict a knockout, submission or just a win?

CW: I'll take it however it comes, but I always enjoy finishing with strikes. My win ratio is about 1:1 with TKOs and Subs though cause guys don't usually hang out for long after the exchanges start.

PC: You could make a major statement in this fight on the biggest stage of your career. Some fighters in this position play it very safe. Can we expect you to take some risk in this fight?

CW: I think the potential is there for fight of the night. I have an exciting style and I like to trade blows. I'll risk getting knocked out to try for a knockout myself. If that's what you mean by taking risks, then yes, I'm prepared to take some risks. I don't plan to throw caution to the wind and play his game though.

PC: Thank you for your time and good luck in Ohio. Is there anything you want to say in closing?

CW: Yes. Check out my website at www.chriswilsonmma.com and I also want to thank Premier Fighter, Metabolic Adaptation, Sports Lab and www.strengthcoachonline.com for their support. Make sure you see this fight. I plan to ruin Jon's night.

"I think my ground positioning is better, my wrestling is going to be better and I think we're pretty equal in the striking department," stated UFC welterweight contender Jon Fitch as he talked about his upcoming clash with Chris Wilson at UFC 82 in Columbus, Ohio. "I've done enough to deserve a title shot," he continued as he discussed his strong desire to fight the top names in the division. Check out what else he had to say about the fight, his thoughts on Karyo Parisyan and much more.

PC: How are you doing?

JF: I'm doing good.

PC: How's training going for your fight against Chris Wilson at UFC 82?

JF: Training is going pretty good. We had to switch gears in the middle of training camp. Chris has a different style, but it happened early enough to where we had plenty of time to make the changes. I have a hard workout tonight, hard sparring tomorrow and then just cardio and posting up for the fight.

PC: I know you're a big welterweight. How is your weight doing right now?

JF: My weight is doing really good right now. I was a little bit heavy going into the Diego fight because I wanted to be a little bit bigger for that fight, but I think speed and cardio is going to be more beneficial for this fight so I kept my weight a little bit lower.

PC: You've been very patient waiting on your shot at the title, but if you're successful against Wilson, do you think you should get the Serra/St-Pierre winner?

JF: I feel like I've paid my dues and I've done enough to deserve a title shot. It's like I said before though, what I think doesn't really matter so I kind of just have to show up and fight my ass off and hopefully the powers that be will give me that opportunity.

PC: Do you think it's more pressure on you to try to win 15 fights in a row and be in line for a title shot or do you think he faces more pressure making his Octagon debut against a fighter of your caliber?

JF: It's definitely some pressure on him because just the whole process of your first UFC fight affects most people. I don't really put much pressure on myself because to me, it's kind of a big game. It's something I enjoy doing and it's something fun to do. Win or lose, as long as I'm improving and giving my best effort, I'm a happy person. I don't put much pressure on myself like, "Oh, I have to win this and make all of this money." I was happy when I was living up here and just barely scraping by as long as I was learning new stuff every day. I just want to develop as a fighter every day and I'm happy.

PC: I interviewed Chris yesterday and he says he plans on ruining your night and that he did see some tendencies that you've done your whole career that he thinks he can capitalize on. Do you think you've found some things in him that suits your style?

JF: Yeah, definitely! Everybody has weaknesses and I definitely do. I noticed some things he has a tendency to do, certain combination sets and other things that he does repetitively that he may not be aware of. That's just the nature of the fight game, to figure out what your opponent's doing wrong and exploit what he's doing wrong. That's the thing you have to figure out, what they are doing wrong, and then be able to physically impose and make them pay for it.

PC: I'm sure you're aware that Wilson would like to keep this fight standing. What is your gameplan going into this fight?

JF: I usually use the same gameplan to go into every fight. I usually work on a couple of scenarios. You hear a lot of people say that you have a plan going into a fight until you get hit and then your plan goes out of the window. Well, those people have improperly planned; that's the problem. You're supposed to have several options going into every fight and if this happens, I'm going to go down this road and if this happens, I'm going to go down this road. You have a lot of forks in the road, that way, when you hit them going into a fight, you don't just throw your plan out of the window and get into a freefall. You just slide into your list of the next things to do. I always go into a fight with the same concept. I always move forward applying pressure and then the fight kind of unfolds itself. You just kind of let what's going to happen unfold as it happens.

PC: What did you know about Chris when his name came up as an opponent and what do you know about him as of now?

JF: I hadn't heard of him before. I don't really follow the IFL. Even in the UFC, it's so many fights going on now on the undercards, it's hard to keep track of a lot of the new talent. Once I got the name, I started to do the research and he's a solid guy. I think my ground positioning is better, my wrestling is going to be better and I think we're pretty equal in the striking department. I just haven't had the opportunity to show mine. He's got a very good crack. He's got very long arms and very good knees, especially that rear leg knee. He throws that thing viciously and very fast. He has one of those styles that you have to stay really tight because he throws those punches at strange angles because of his length. He happens to be very funky on the ground too so you have to be really tight on the ground too. A lot of what we've been working on is keeping everything extremely tight and technical.

PC: Is the welterweight title your goal for this year, either fighting for it or having it?

JF: I actually think I deserve to fight for it, but the title is not my ultimate goal. The biggest appeal for the title to me is that once you have it, you get to fight all of the top guys. It's no more dark matches, who's this guy or why is he fighting this guy or who is Jon Fitch? You're finally in a place where you will fight all of the marquee guys and that's why I'm in the sport. Why do something half-ass, you know? If I wanted to beat up a bunch of bums, I could've stayed in Indiana and fought in the Midwest circuit and I would have 100 wins by now and you would've never heard of any of my opponents. But I don't want that. I want to fight the top guys out there and that's one thing that the title brings you; especially in the UFC. We have all of the best in each weight class out there except for maybe 2 or 3 guys.

PC: We had so many upsets last year, for you to win 14 fights in a row is amazing. Do you finally feel like people know who you are?

JF: I think it happened when I won the Diego fight. A lot of people had never heard of me or didn't even know anything about me until that fight or the promotion to that fight. The UFC is now starting to play my old fights on the Unleashed episodes and the UFC Wired. I'm starting to get a little more noticed and people are starting to get more educated and finding out who Jon Fitch is.

PC: He said he's been training with middleweights and light heavyweights to prepare for your size. Have you brought in rangier guys to deal with his reach or have you kept the same camp?

JF: The thing is, our gym has so many different guys with so many different abilities that I can switch a few different guys. Swick is back from vacation and I got to spar with him the other day and he's got that long reach and that quickness. There's no way Chris is going to be as fast as Swick so I have speed and his reach to deal with. We have another guy named Luke Rockwell and he's 6'3". He fights at 185 and I think he could make 170. He's an extremely long guy to deal with so yeah, I have some guys in here to deal with that reach. I have top wrestlers to deal with, Jake Shields and Dave Camarillo, so we have full camp and a lot of different types of guys to deal with so I feel I'm ready for his style.

PC: How does it feel to be a part of such a huge card?

JF: This is a huge card. I think Henderson and Silva is the best fight since like Tito- Chuck 1. I think outside of Randy- Fedor, this is the biggest fight. When they announced it, I was like, "No way, they got Henderson to drop to '85." I heard that and that it was going to be in Columbus and I got word to "Crazy" Bob, my manager, to get me on that card. I had to be on this card. I had to be in Ohio and I want to see this fight. We all sign like 150 posters before these events and we get a couple so everybody fighting on that card's signature is on that poster so it's nice to be a part of a big card. It helps you become a part of history.

PC: Do you feel like Karo Parisyan ducked you in any kind of way?

JF: I haven't heard any of the stuff he's said. I always hear it second-hand from other people. People always ask me questions about what he said or what he's doing and I have no idea. All I know is I've been asking for him to fight and my manager has been asking for him to fight for a year now. I think it's basically between him and me for that number 1 spot and it's been like that for a while now. I keep asking for that. I don't know why it hasn't happened so I'm not putting the blame on anybody. I've never talked any kind of smack towards him because he's a great fighter and a good guy, but it's a fight that should happen in order to get that top ranking.

PC: How can we expect Josh Koscheck to look in his comeback and do you credit Swick's struggle with Burkman to his layoff?

JF: He's looking better than he did before his fight with George. Koscheck gave St-Pierre a better fight than anyone else has in years with the exception of Serra. It's a lot of haters like to talk smack, but whatever! St-Pierre dismantled Hughes twice and if Koscheck gets a couple more takedowns in that 3rd round, it becomes a very close fight. I think he was in that fight and he's going to come back really hard and come after Hazelett and make a statement. The time off was a big part of it and the mental part as well. He didn't want to get laid on for 3 rounds again. He was so afraid of losing a boring fight on Fight Night, but it's important he puts on exciting fights for his fans. I think he knocks Burkman out 9 fights out of 10. He'll be back even stronger next fight.

PC: It's always an honor having you on the website my man. Good luck in Columbus. I definitely think you're the most dangerous opponent for any welterweight. Is there anything you want to say in closing?

JF: I want to thank toe2toe.tv for all of their support and tell people to go to fitchfighter.com.

Source - FIGHTHYPE \\ A FIGHT IS A FIGHT




I figured there was no point in posting these separately, because there will be two threads discussing the exact same thing..

[peno]

I know I'm the odd man out on this one but I hope Fitch get destroyed.

[rivethead]

it was nice to see him discuss the Karo situation in a hype free way.

rh