Curtis Blaydes doesn’t see Ciryl Gane filling the holes in his grappling game.
Gane (11-2 MMA, 8-2 UFC) was quickly taken down and submitted by Jon Jones (27-1 MMA, 21-1 UFC) in their vacant heavyweight title fight earlier this month at UFC 285.
Wrestling also cost Gane in his title fight against Francis Ngannou at UFC 270, in which he was taken down four times. “Bon Gamin” is already back to work and intent on improving his grappling, but the UFC’s leader in most takedowns landed doesn’t see Gane ever reaching a high enough level.
“I think he’s like a lot of guys: He got away without having to wrestle, just like Francis when he fought Stipe (Miocic)” Blaydes said in an interview with LowKick MMA. “He got away with not having to learn how to wrestle. It’s not just him.
“There’s a lot of guys with holes in their games because they only focus on one aspect of MMA. It’s not like we didn’t already know that it was a hole. I know a lot of people are expecting him just to plug it. It takes years to learn how to grapple. He’s not going to get it. He’s not going to get it. I don’t expect him to get it.”
Considering the stylistic matchup, Blaydes (17-3 MMA, 12-3 UFC) says the Jones vs. Gane fight played out the way he expected it to – just quicker.
“I don’t think anyone expected it to end that fast,” Blaydes said. “But I’m not shocked at how he was able to take him down and hold him down and get on his neck.
“When you have a hole that big in your grappling and then you are going against Jones who, that’s like a strength of his – I thought it was going to be elbows. I didn’t think it would be a submission. So I guess that was a little surprising, but I’m not surprised he got the finish. I was expecting the finish.”
Blaydes will look to emerge as a title contender when he faces the streaking Sergei Pavlovich in the UFC Fight Night 222 headliner April 22.
