Against Josh Thomson, K.J. Noons Only Worried About Getting Held Down

Ahead of the fight, Noons joined the Sherdog Radio Network’s “Savage Dog Show” to discuss his opponent, the main event between Miesha Tate and Ronda Rousey and more.

Noons on whether he thinks his bout against Thomson is a title eliminator: “I’m just super excited to stay busy and fight. We don’t really know. At the same time they want to keep Gilbert busy, they might have the winner of this fight again before Gilbert. I don’t know. I’m just kind of focusing on this fight and hopefully I put on a good performance and then we’ll go from there.”

On preparing for Thomson: “I’ve just been training super hard and really trying to become more of an all-around better MMA fighter. Better with my wrestling, better with my jiu-jitsu, better with my kicks instead of just boxing. I think [just boxing] has kind of held me back, and that’s what I’ve been working on. I think that’s what’s going to help me out even [more] this fight than last fight.”

On his takedown defense: “I think I can get up at any time and have the conditioning if I am taken down. I just don’t want to be taken down and held down and then [lose] rounds. Like you know, me more dominant on the feet, but then he gets a takedown and just lays on me and he gets the round in the bag. That’s the only thing I’m really worried about.”

On whether getting held down is a typical worry: “Oh, of course because you could be actually winning the whole round and they take you down and lay on you for 30 seconds and some stupid-ass judge, who doesn’t know s--t, gives it to the other fighter. How about we judge it like this? How about, if you shot on me 10 times and I defended it 10 times, why don’t I get the point for defending it? Because defending it is probably harder than just football tackling somebody.”

On being held down: “You’re going to have to get out of that and get that point back or do something else because you’re losing the round. You could be losing the fight. You have to change the game. You have to change the game up.”

On Tate vs. Rousey being the headliner: “It’s entertainment at the end of the day, right? Isn’t it? To me it’s like, if [fans] want to watch it, they want to watch it. I’m just concentrating on my fight. I kind of look at it like it’s cool. It’s a title fight. Kind of like the WNBA championship or something, you know what I mean? If you like that kind of stuff, you’re going to watch it. I’m excited for them.”

Listen to the full interview (beginning at 1:00:30).