The greatest MMA flyweight fighter ever will look to add another belt to his collection.
Demetrious Johnson will get his long-awaited shot at the ONE Championship flyweight title against champion Adriano Moraes on Feb. 24, Asia’s ONE announced Friday. The current plan is for the card to be in Singapore, though that is not official, per sources. ESPN has Johnson ranked No. 7 in its MMA pound-for-pound rankings.
Since going to ONE from the UFC in 2018 in a rare trade, Johnson is 3-0. He’s coming off a victory in the ONE Championship Flyweight Grand Prix in October 2019. “Mighty Mouse” was supposed to fight Moraes for the title back in May, but the card was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Johnson (30-3-1) owns the most consecutive title defenses in UFC history (11). The Washington state resident was unbeaten in 14 straight fights between 2012 and 2017, a period in which he was considered one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world. Johnson, 34, lost the UFC title to Henry Cejudo in a close decision at UFC 227 in August 2018. Two months later, Johnson was traded by the UFC — a nearly unprecedented occurrence in MMA — to ONE in exchange for then-ONE welterweight champion Ben Askren.
Moraes (18-3) won the ONE flyweight title back from Geje Eustaquio in January 2019, his last bout. The Brazil native lost the belt to Eustaquio one bout prior in June 2018. Moraes, 31, holds a 9-3 record in ONE going back to 2013.