Updated throughout the day with quick takes from staff.
Kenny Florian's faintness when it comes to wrestling has never been much of a secret, so after another loss to a superior wrestler it's not all that surprising to see him make this move. Sherdog is reporting that Florian has hired Sean Gray, the assistant wrestling coach at Boston University, in an effort to what I can only assume to be a revamp of his wrestling technique. Florian most recently dropped a three round decision loss to Gray Maynard, one of the strongest grapplers in the UFC's lightweight division.
Along with the loss, 'Ken Flo' also missed out on another attempt at the lightweight crown, as the bout determined the next No. 1 lightweight contender. Florian previously had two unsuccessful trips up to meet the king of the mountain at 155 lbs, first losing a five round decision to Sean Sherk at UFC 64, and again when he was forced to submit via rear naked choke to BJ Penn at UFC 101. The Boston native has nixed plans for a quick return to action, looking to take his time working to improve his game.
"It looks like my training team wants me to fight in another five months," said Florian during an interview Tuesday on the Sherdog Radio Network's "It's Time!" show with Bruce Buffer. "I'm more motivated than ever. I'm pissed, to be honest. I want to crush my training. That's what I'm focused on right now. I just hired the assistant wrestling coach at Boston University (Sean Gray) to be my wrestling coach here in Boston and I have other plans for a lot of other things as far as training goes."
"Losses are blessings in disguise," said Florian, who holds wins over Takanori Gomi, Joe Stevenson, Clay Guida, Roger Huerta and Joe Lauzon in his last seven bouts. "I've never been more motivated in my life. I kind of feel like this was one of the most frustrating losses that I've ever had and it was a fight I definitely learned a lot from. I'm very motivated and I had to come back to training quickly. I've already started training and did a hard conditioning session (Tuesday). I'm just motivated to work very hard and get right back into it."
Florian doesn't seem too surprised about Maynard's gameplan at UFC 118. During his pre-fight interviews he appeared fairly candid about what he expected Maynard to try to do in their fight, so I'm not exactly sure why this hire wasn't made sooner.
"I kind of figured that's what he would do," Florian said in reference to Maynard's wrestling-first game plan. "Gray's stood up with people before, but I had an inkling (Maynard would go for takedowns). I knew he was going to do what he had to do to get the win, which was exactly what he should've done. It was a smart game plan by him. He's the best wrestler in the lightweight division and one of the best in the UFC."
"I need to make sure my game is capable of beating everybody in every aspect and it wasn't. So, I've been doing wrestling every single day. I've been watching wrestling and researching wrestling every single day," he said.
Kenny has had problems with superior wrestlers for years, so we've kinda heard this whole spiel before. Each of his four losses in the UFC have been at the hands of a grappler, and while Kenny has improved leaps and bounds from his dismantling loss to Diego Sanchez back in 2005, the gameplan to take him out hasn't changed: get him on his back. Sherdog makes mention of a possible matchup with George Sotiropoulos, but I'm not too sure he's the first guy you would want to fight to showcase your fancy new ground game. After the clinic Sotiropoulos ran at the expense of Joe Stevenson back at UFC 110 in February, Kenny should think twice about that one. Black belt be damned.
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