Bader: I am not scared, it will be a dog fight

I’m not scared of him. That’s one thing, I’m not going to fight him scared. He’s fought some really tough guys but every fighter is different. I’m different than Matt Hamill, than Vera, than Matyushenko; we all present our own problems. For me, I’m a tough wrestler. I have the mental capacity to make it a dogfight and take it in deep water. With my wrestling combined with my knockout power, I bring a lot to the table and even more than what you’ve seen in my last couple of fights.

This is a huge fight for me. It has a lot of implications for my career, but it’s just another fight, he’s just another fighter. I put pressure on myself for every fight. I’m highly competitive. When I was fighting in smaller shows and wrestling matches, to the Ultimate Fighter and now huge fights like this, I train the same. I’m my biggest critic and I want to go out there and not only win, I want to be exciting.

Obviously I’m not going to give away my game plan, but if the opportunity presents itself in the second or third round, you’ll see some interesting stuff from me. We are pretty much opposite fighters. He’s got unorthodox technique, he’s very long, we have totally different bodies, and we couldn’t be any further apart. The only thing I would say is similar is the wrestling. I feel with my wrestling and my boxing, my ability to take him down and knock him out presents a lot of problems. I’m just working on mixing it up well. He’s obviously a great fighter too and he brings a lot to the table. I’m going to stay tight, use my wrestling and boxing and throw some kicks and knees in there.

He’s got all the hype and everything but if you put any one of those top ten guys in front of me it’s going to be a dog fight, he says. It’s a highly competitive division. When you start looking at those names and who I have to go through to reach my goal, you’ve got to take one fight at a time. It’s a hard division but that’s where I want to be.

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