Speaking to James Lynch of LowKick MMA, Blaydes said the match up was one he and his team have been anticipating for a while.
“Yeah. I knew it would be the winner of that fight,” Blaydes said of Rozenstruik’s victory over Augusto Sakai. “I was hoping it would be Jairzinho, just because he’s a bigger name, he’s higher ranked. It wasn’t like a shock. We expected it, and we’ve been planning for months and months.”
“I wasn’t overly impressed with the technique,” Blaydes said. “Obviously the power is impressive, but the technique is not… like watching him, I watched him when he fought Gane and you could just tell the difference in the speed and fluidity and the technique. Jairzinho is more of your old school, classic plodder. You go, I go, you go, I go. I don’t find him that explosive, he doesn’t have crazy attacks. It’s pretty basic. But it works for him, he sticks with what he knows. He doesn’t bring a lot of diversity which does make it a little easier to gameplan, but you always have to be aware of the power.”