AS Demetrious Johnson prepares for a critical rematch against One Championship flyweight titlist Adriano Moraes, he’s making sure he gets all the help he needs.
That includes training with a guy already has fought twice.
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Johnson has been working with old rival Henry Cejudo entering his rematch at One Fight Night 1 on Saturday morning at the Singapore Indoor Stadium.
“We [had] this vacation already planned to go out to Arizona and to stay in our vacation home. Henry Cejudo's gym, Fight Ready – amazing gym – it's out there,” Johnson said.
“I reached out to him and [said], ‘Hey, when I come back out there, do you want to get together and train?’ He said, ‘Absolutely, man.’ So I reached out to him and said, ‘Hey, I'm back out here for two weeks. Let's get to work.’ And he said, ‘Let's do it.’"
Cejudo, who has been retired since 2020, split his two bouts with Johnson and has even teased facing the American again should he win the One flyweight title.
However, their contract obligations may keep that trilogy bout as just a dream.
That isn’t an issue for Johnson, though, as he welcomes working with Cejudo during fight camps, and he even plans to go back there by the end of the year to train with him again.
“He's got a couple of fights [on] this contract. I got a couple of fights [on] my contract. I'm going to go back out there in November and train with him. So, you know, if we were to fight, it'd be a totally different perspective,” Johnson said.
“There's respect between [us], two amazing athletes. I've respected everything he's done in mixed martial arts, and in wrestling, he's respected everything I've done and I'm still doing in mixed martial arts.”
The relationship between them looks like something straight out of a movie, and Johnson has already found the perfect comparison to this situation.
“It kind of reminds me of Rocky and Apollo. Because we're in a gym and we both competed against each other, just like Rocky and Apollo competed with each other two times,” he said.
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