Joe Rogan and Demetrious Johnson rave about ONE Championship’s all-striking contests

While there is certainly a risk in supplementing the MMA offerings of ONE Championship with the striking arts, Demetrious Johnson is among the many hardcore fans that are relishing it.

Demetrious Johnson and Joe Rogan might just be the two most hardcore MMA fans. The ONE flyweight world champion Johnson made a recent appearance on the popular Joe Rogan Experience podcast to discuss a variety of topics, including the current state of the promotion.

Both Johnson and Rogan had high praise for the kickboxing and muay thai fights promoted by ONE Championship. Rogan, a longtime MMA commentator and BJJ practitioner, weighed in:

"That’s also one of the beautiful things they do in ONE is that you get to see striking with no grappling. So you get to see the most elite expression."

Demetrious Johnson expressed his love for the striking arts as well, believing it has a special mainstream appeal:

"When I’m sitting there and people are like, 'Oh man, what do you like to watch?’ Obviously I like to watch mixed martial arts but when I get the chance to watch, [I like to watch] high level kickboxing, especially heavyweights who move fast. People are like, ‘I hate watching grappling.’ I was like, ‘Perfect, watch this and don’t say anything. Shut your mouth and just enjoy this stand-up.’ I just love it, it’s just the purest, like MMA striking will never get there."

Demetrious Johnson even put his money where his mouth is by competing in a mixed-rules fight with Muay Thai veteran Rodtang Jitmuangnon at ONE X earlier this year. Beginning with the first round, every odd-numbered round of the fight adhered to ONE Championship Muay Thai rules, apparently favoring Rodtang.

Nevertheless, “Mighty Mouse” survived the damage from the Muay Thai striker, and submitted Rodtang in the second round, which was contested in MMA rules.

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Demetrious Johnson reveals his favorite kickboxer in ONE Championship

In the same interview on JRE, Demetrious Johnson shared who his favorite kickboxer to watch in ONE Championship is:

"The biggest thing that I like about ONE Championship is like, oh man, the striking’s unbelievable, but I was like no dude, if you wanna see some high-level f***ing striking like Superbon and Giorgio [Petrosyan], my favorite person to watch that’s just pure kickboxing is Hiroki Akimoto."

Johnson then went on to describe the feeling of seeing Akimoto perform live:

"I was there live when he won the belt, I think it was in Singapore. I was sitting there watching I was like, ‘Oh my God, this man.’ Like his bop, bop, bop, kick and he’ll block, and then he’ll fire back immediately. It was like absolutely amazing. I’m just blown away."

Akimoto will compete in a few short weeks in the main event of ONE 163, defending his bantamweight kickboxing world championship against Petchtanong on November 19. The fight takes the main event slot on a card loaded with Japanese talent, including Ituski Hirata, Yushin Okami, and Yuya Wakamatsu.