Kamaru Usman wants to see the Fighting Nerds focus on one particular aspect of their game.
The four faces of the Brazil-based team all recently suffered their first octagon losses. Carlos Prates dropped a main event to Ian Machado Garry in April after he was taken down four times. Caio Borralho failed on his five takedown attempts in a decision loss to Nassourdine Imavov earlier this month in the UFC Fight Night 258 headliner in Paris. One fight earlier in the co-main event, Mauricio Ruffy was submitted by Benoit Saint Denis, and this past Saturday at Noche UFC, Jean Silva was dominated on the ground in Round 1 of his headliner against Diego Lopes before getting knocked out in Round 2.
Usman noticed a common weakness in all of their games and would like to see emphasis on wrestling from their coaching staff.
“They have an incredible team, I think they could add to that team, and that’s probably someone to work on the wrestling,” Usman said on his “Pound 4 Pound” podcast with Henry Cejudo. “Having that wrestling background is something Caio Borralho could have utilized in getting those takedowns in that fight, which I think could have potentially helped him and blew that fight away. With Carlos Prates, the fight that he did lose to Ian Garry, of course Ian was really good at just moving away and then maybe drop down and get a takedown, control him. Then the Mauricio Ruffy fight, Saint Denis was just all over him. Once he got him down, he was able to punish him down there.
“So, I do think these guys would definitely benefit from a wrestling coach. … We had Greg (Jones) at one point. We had Kenny Monday at one point. We’ve had Mike van Arsdale at one point. Our team, I think that our foundation was when we were the Blackzilians, it was hot. The one that they did very well is Rashad Evans made it a point for us to have a wrestling coach because obviously you know Rashad is a wrestler, as well. We had to have a wrestling coach because everyone knew our standup was so good at that time because of coach Henri Hooft. This is something that the Fighting Nerds can utilize, is getting a good wrestling coach out there.”
Prates has since rebounded from his loss to Machado Garry with a first-round, spinning back elbow knockout of Geoff Neal at UFC 319.
