Mikey
Musumeci deems Joao Gabriel Sousa’s body type as the biggest
challenge, apart from the Brazilian’s strength.
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Musumeci will look to correct a 2021 loss when he takes on Sousa in
a 145-pound rematch at
ONE 167 in Bangkok on June 7. Musumeci hasn’t lost a bout since
suffering a submission loss against Sousa in their first encounter.
Reflecting on that loss, Musumeci admits that Sousa was evidently
stronger than him.
Planning to leave no stone unturned to exact revenge, Musumeci has
been working on his strength with Sam “Coach Cal” Calvitta at the
Treigning Lab. Apart from the strength, Musumeci sees Sousa’s body
type as the biggest challenge. According to “Darth Rigatoni,”
comparatively short-limbed fighters like Sousa have an advantage in
no-gi jiu-jitsu as they are hard to grab ahold of.
“Gabriel has very small limbs. He has no arms, no legs. Which in
no-gi, it helps people built like that; like dinosaurs kind of. In
the gi, they have a very hard time, this body type, because of
grips on the sleeves and the legs. So, they’re really easy to
control, like, omoplata them, take their back,” Musumeci explained,
“But in no-gi, this body type doesn’t need as many things. They
just have no limbs, so they could just keep moving every second.
And if they have a lot of power, they could just explode and use
that to their advantage. So, he has the ideal body type for no-gi,
I feel.”
Working on controlling opponents with shorter limbs was Musumeci’s
prime focus in preparing for his upcoming bout. With the goal of
improving his jiu-jitsu as much as possible, Musumeci has been
treating the matchup like a science experiment.
“He’s like a missile. He’s so small and explosive. He doesn’t come
in, then he just comes in one motion. Boom, boom!” said Musumeci.
“So, he’s very physical, very aggressive and, definitely, his body
type plays a role in that because he’s hard to control. So for me,
it was a learning curve how to control someone with that tiny body
type, with those arms and legs very small. It’s completely
different than long, monkey people in no-gi. So, I feel like that
was my learning curve for this match.
“I obsessed about how to control someone with tiny legs, tiny arms.
It’s a whole different style of jiu-jitsu. So, I really treated
Gabriel as like a science experiment, like a lab experiment, you
know, and I did a lot of work for this match. So, and just in
jiu-jitsu in general, you know, like, I just see it as me trying to
perfect my jiu-jitsu. My goal in jiu-jitsu is mastery. So, I had to
master how to deal with both these body types.”