Joe Praises Valentina Shevchenko's Dominance

Well you're not just a UFC champion, you're one of the best champions. It's very unique to watch you fight because you're one of those people like Anderson Silva and his prime where you've kind of cleaned out your division. You know, and there's no disrespect to your opponents, but some of your opponents when I'm watching you fight them, I'm not thinking are they going to beat you. I'm thinking what are you going to do to them? It's a strange position to be in where you're almost like competing, you're competing against these women, but your level is so much higher than everyone else in this 125 pound division that there's just not much there for you in terms of like Valentina has to fight this woman. There's no fight like that for you. I think that definitely this is one of my goals in my performance, in my training and definitely this is like what I, the idea of my fight style to be able to win the fight made the fight very beautiful from the technical side, very intensive, very like just high level martial arts, but in the same time without dude like dirty fight, like street fight, just like different level when you can finish your opponent without them touch you. So this is kind of like ideally ideal. Well you can see how you sometimes impose the opponent's style on them. It's almost like you're challenging yourself like the Jessica Andrade fight like in the coming into that fight most people thought the only way she would have any sort of advantage at all would possibly be grappling. So what did you do? You out grapple there. Like did you do that on purpose? No, no, no. I don't know. This is what I think it's no because maybe people just like was speaking about that so much so frequently before the fight. Maybe it's just stay in my mind and was there. But you know, I never felt that this is a position dangerous for me since the beginning. Since I like I know exactly what is my strength. I know exactly what is my power. That's why it's never was a doubt. Would I be good there? No, I know what I can. I know exactly what I have to worry about. What I have to worry about in the fight. I know that I have to be careful like to see everything because it's MMA everything can happen. You cannot just go there and say okay I'm a champion. Everyone has to fall down. No, you cannot. You have to be wild. You have to be like a wild animal ready for anything. But in the same time you just you cannot overestimate your opponent because you are overestimate them. It's going to be like not interested in fights. You're going to be like just afraid of throwing anything. And that's why it's you have to find the balance and the balance is everything where you are like you can do whatever without any fear. But in the same time very careful. I never before the fight put some like challenges for me. Would I be good there? Would I be good like what I do like for my next fight? I train myself for the different situation. And this is what we are working like and it's not just my work. It's like teamwork. Pavel Antonina we all watching our opponents and we share what we think about them. What we have to be worried. What we have to work on. And through our training camp through trainings we just work on every possible situation. And even for example I saw some situation in the fight was happening like not with my opponent or like different completely different fight. And we try this situation. We try what I will do. How I would escape or how I will finish from this situation. So we just getting ready for anything. And this is what I think helped me to take right decision during the fight. Because I don't have time to think about what I will do next. What my technique will be next. In the fight everything happens like instantly. And I have to be sure that my brain and my body ready to act. Well it's very clear that you have a very well rounded skill set. But it's also clear that when you're faced with particular challenges your preparation for those particular challenges almost puts you in a situation where you want to try like the Juliana Pena fights. Good example of that right. Like you shocked the world when you armbarred her. Because everybody felt like if she had a chance to beat you it would be grappling. And you as a Muay Thai champion if you had a chance to beat her it would be your striking. But then when you submitted her everybody was like holy shit. Like that was a wake up call for a lot of people that you're not just well rounded but you are capable of finishing everywhere. That you're lethal everywhere. Yeah this is what every time was in my training. My goals for the competition. Not just go there and compete. But go there and win. Doesn't matter what I have to do to win the fight. I have to find the solution. I have to find the way to win the fight. And every time it was like my mindset. I don't like this idea just go and have fun in the fight. I don't like idea just be there and like just to experience the feeling. I think for someone it's good. But if you have like higher goals for yourself you have to put higher goals. Like higher like things what you're thinking. This is in my head. This is what I had since the beginning. That no matter what happening I have to find solution. To turn the fight to my side and win the fight. And definitely I was like I understood fighting in mixed martial arts. I have to have more arms. I have to have more advantages. Like if we are comparing with other fighter. Because more advantage you have. It's kind of like in the war right. You have a handgun. You have like certain like percentage to win. You have like more like arms in your like position. You have more percentages. So I want to have like 100 percent percentage to win the fight. That's why I was training like everything. And like training not just pretend to do technique. But know how to make people tap after this technique. Yeah, so when you say more arms you mean more weapons right. Exactly. Yeah, just for people to. Watch the entire episode for free only on Spotify.