This weekend could be another Trevor Wittman success story with both Rose Namajunas and Justin Gaethje in title fights.
UFC 274 will see Thug Rose defend her UFC women’s strawweight crown against Carla Esparza while Gaethje challenges Charles Oliveira for the UFC lightweight title.
Wittman coaches both athletes and is also the coach of UFC welterweight champion and number one pound-for-pound fighter, Kamaru Usman.
He keeps a small team these days that certainly packs quality over quantity. Gaethje is challenging for the 155lb title for the second time after losing to Khabib Nurmagomedov in 2020.
That was his only loss in his last six and only his third loss ever and Namajunas told talkSPORT she’s seen a new man emerge during camp for this fight.
“It's been really, truly amazing watching Gaethje's growth. He's always been super-talented and super gifted. He's a freak of an athlete,” Namajunas explained.
“But then seeing him really taking his nutrition, his technique, strategies, cardio and all the things like that, he's taken it to a whole new level as far as being disciplined and consistent and all the other stuff that goes with being a professional fighter, a professional athlete.
“I think that's going to really make a difference in this fight and we're going to see a whole new version of Gaethje that is going to be hard to beat. I predict him coming out as the champion,” Namajunas confidently predicted.
Wittman is commonly regarded as one of the top coaches in MMA today and Namajunas believes when you get to a certain level, there’s a great benefit to having a smaller, more intimate team.
“You look at boxing, Floyd Mayweather doesn't go to class. He has a bunch of people that are surrounding him... actually, I don't really know what he does [laughs].
“I would imagine that he has a bunch of people who do specific things for him. But I do think there is a benefit in going to a big team atmosphere, it's just being around other fighters and all that stuff. That's really important as you're coming up.
“But when you reach this level things get more and more specific and detailed. Trevor's the best coach in UFC,” Namajunas said with a smile.
Thug Rose sits atop of the 115lb women’s division in UFC for a second time after beating Weili Zhang twice to close that chapter, but now she is revisiting an old one by facing Esparza, the woman who handed Namajunas her first ever loss in UFC back in 2014.
Like Gaethje, Namajunas has some eye-opening moments of her own that helped shape her into becoming a better fighter and thus, a champion.
“I had a few moments,” Namajunas started. “My first MMA loss I realised, I should probably have a goal or something [laughs] instead of just having fights and winning.
“So when I lost to Tecia [Torres] in Invicta I thought I got to have a goal to be the champion. And before then, I didn't care about belts or medals or trophies or anything like that.
“I had, not a bitter taste in my mouth, but I felt like I don't need no stinking materialistic thing to tell me what I am! So I just believed it.
“But then I realised, well, it's a symbol. It's a goal, a milestone. It all starts in here first [points to her head]. After that, then I started pursuing it and I was like oh, when you set a goal it's harder than it seems, right?
“Then I ended up losing to Carla, but I got really close to the belt. I thought well, if I got that close with kind of trying, I knew I could try more. I had a couple more bumps a long the road but eventually got there,” Namajunas recalled.
“The other bump in the road was knowing my purpose for what I'm doing and that really propelled me to success as well.”
With classics against Joanna Jędrzejczyk, avenging Jessica Andrade and then the pair of clashes with Zhang, Namajunas will have beaten most of the top contenders at strawweight if she can beat Esparza at UFC 274.
Could a move up to flyweight appeal?
“We'll see how this weight cut goes [laughs]. Honestly, I do feel as though I'm very capable of fighting at 125 because of my frame, I have a big frame. My hands are bantamweight size hands,” Namajunas reasoned.
“I would just need to probably put more muscle on but even then, I feel super strong, maybe I wouldn't have to.
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“That is a possibility. Right now, I have my work cut out for me. Carla is the main goal and the main mission is to defeat her. Then we'll look at some things after this.”
A showdown with flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko sounds good to us.
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