Former UFC Welterweight Champion Johny Hendricks will be taking on Tim Boetsch in a few short weeks at UFC Fight Night 112.
This will be Hendricks second fight at middleweight and it is an opportunity the former champion is excited for.
“I am looking forward to this one,” Hendricks said to MMA Junkie Radio. “I already hear what everybody’s saying, how (Tim Boetsch) is bigger than me, so he’s got tot be stronger than me. And, you know what, I’m quicker than those guys. And I’m actually trained for this fight. And I’m so excited to see what I can do with a guy who used to fight at 205. If I go out there, and I can manhandle a guy who used to fight at 205, what does that mean? That I can move up to 205, then?”
Hendricks won his middleweight division debut when he defeated former Bellator MMA Middleweight Champion Hector Lombard at UFC Fight Night 105.
The former champion does have a plan to defeat Boetsch and it all has to do with the fighter's pacing.
“He’s going to throw a couple of leg kicks, and they’re not going to be something he wants kill you with,” Hendricks said. “But he wants to set up his hands. Knowing that, but he’s going to be a guy who’s just going to try to bully me. That’s sort of the way I went into the Hector Lombard fight. It’s that there’s a guy who’s going to want to try to pressure forward. He has knockout power, but he’s going to try to push forward, push his pace. And if you can knock him off their pace, then everything starts landing in your favor. And that’s sort of what I have to do with Tim. I have to go out there, I have to not let him think he’s being the dominant fighter.”
UFC Fight Night 11 takes place on Saturday, June 25 from the Chesapeake Energy Center in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma with Michael Chiesa and Kevin Lee headlining. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event.
