A post shared by ONE Championship (@onechampionship) on Mar 27, 2019 at 4:00am PDT
On March 31st, ONE hosts its ONE Championship 92: A New Era event that headlines Eduard Folayang and Jiujitsu legend, Shinya Aoki. This particular event is a milestone in that it will feature former UFC champions Demetrious Johnson and Eddie Alvarez. It will be the debut of both fighters within the promotion after their contract releases from the UFC in late 2018. Other notable fighters include defending champ Angela Lee and EBI champion, Garry Tonon.
A post shared by ONE Championship (@onechampionship) on Mar 29, 2019 at 8:02pm PDT
To begin with, Demetrious “Mighty Mouse” Johnson’s fight against Yuya Wakamatsu will be his first since his controversial title loss to now champ champ, Henry Cejudo. Shortly afterward, he was signed with ONE Championship in a promotional trade with the UFC for former champion Ben Askren. Johnson’s fight against Wakamatsu will be for the quarterfinal in men’s flyweight for ONE.
A post shared by Demetrious Johnson (@mightymouse125) on Mar 29, 2019 at 9:39pm PDT
Former lightweight champion, Eddie Alvarez, will compete against Timofrey Nastyukin in the men’s lightweight quarterfinal. After losing his UFC title to Conor McGregor, he has had one win, one no-contest and one loss and against Justin Gaethje and two bouts and Dustin “Diamond” Poirier. When he was released from his UFC contract, he signed with ONE FC and cited the benefits of being under the Singapore-based promotion. Alvarez has made statements of ONE providing better pay and overall better treatment for fighters.
A post shared by Eddie Alvarez (@ealvarezfight) on Mar 29, 2019 at 10:30pm PDT
The main event will have legendary Pride and Shooto fighter, Shinya Aoki, rematch Eduard Folayang, the same man he lost the ONE lightweight title against. The Evolve MMA team member will try again to prevail against Folayang’s aggressive striking style in the welterweight division. Aoki is coming off of a three-fight win streak after losing back to back against Ben Askren and the previously mentioned Folayang. With both fighters having a huge following in various regions in Asia, there is much curiosity on whether Folayang can repeat his success. Even fans around the judo and jiujitsu world will be eager to see what happens.
A post shared by Eduard Landslide Folayang (@the.landslide) on Mar 28, 2019 at 5:55pm PDT
Angela Lee, who fights out of Evolve MMA like Shinya Aoki, seeks to become a double title holder against Chinese strawweight champion, Jingnan Xiong. Lee looks to gain another title while maintaining her perfect record for a tenth straight win of her MMA career. Xiong is expected to give Lee a variety of problems with a matching well-rounded skill set. If Lee wins, she will become the first woman in ONE’s organization to hold two titles simultaneously.
A post shared by ONE Championship (@onechampionship) on Mar 30, 2019 at 3:00am PDT
High profile Brazilian jiujitsu competitor, Garry Tonon, will try to obtain his fourth win against Anthony Engelen. The submission-only champion has three wins and no losses in his budding MMA career. Although not as popular amongst the MMA world, Tonon’s accolades in submission grappling include his five EBI championships and gold in the 2013 ADCC North American championships. He recently spoke on an interview with MMA Fighting in which he compared the UFC to “stealing from a 7-Eleven.” He elaborated by making the comparison of someone making $100 from a hard day’s work or stealing $100 from a convenient store. Where ONE Championship tries to maintain the honor and respect of martial arts, western promoters like the UFC throw it out in order to give attention to upcoming matches.
A post shared by Garry Lee Tonon (@garrytonon) on Mar 15, 2019 at 7:43pm PDT
This much anticipated card will be streamed on B/R live for anybody who has access to the stream but can still be an issue to American audiences due to time difference. The live stream for the main card is scheduled to begin at 6:30 am for the central time zone in the United States. Other notable fights for this event will include Kevin Belingon vs Bibiano Fernandes for the bantamweight title and Aung La Nsang vs Ken Hasegawa for the middleweight title.
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