{"id":175362,"date":"2025-09-28T12:47:19","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T12:47:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/175362\/"},"modified":"2025-09-28T12:47:19","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T12:47:19","slug":"merabs-coach-on-ufc-320","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/175362\/","title":{"rendered":"Merab’s Coach On UFC 320"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Dvalishvili<\/p>\n

While making his regularly scheduled appearance on the \u201cRay Longo<\/a> Minute\u201d segment of the Anik and Florian Podcast<\/a>, which features UFC commentator John Anik<\/a> alongside his co-host, former UFC<\/a> title challenger and commentator Kenny Florian<\/a>, Longo, a legendary MMA coach, discussed the upcoming title bout involving his star pupil.<\/p>\n

Longo has guided multiple fighters to championship gold, including Chris Weidman<\/a>, Matt Serra<\/a>, Aljamain Sterling<\/a>, and most recently, Merab Dvalishvili.<\/a> Merab is set to face bantamweight contender Cory Sandhagen<\/a> in a highly anticipated matchup at UFC 320.<\/a><\/p>\n

During the podcast, John Anik remarked to Longo, \u201cI think Merab Dvalishvili is the biggest MMA superstar in America among active fighters.\u201d Longo agreed, referencing the champion\u2019s recent training footage<\/a> with Demetrious Johnson<\/a>, who is widely considered one of the top three fighters in MMA history. He added, \u201cHe\u2019s living the American dream at this point, and he loves fighting.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Cory Sandhagen enters the bout following a victory over former flyweight champion Deiveson Figueiredo<\/a>. With Merab having cleared out the top contenders in the division, Sandhagen now gets his second shot at UFC gold and presents a unique stylistic challenge for the reigning champion. When asked by John Anik about the Sandhagen matchup, Longo shared his perspective on the matchup.<\/p>\n

\"Corey<\/p>\n

Ray Longo Acknowledges Cory Sandhagen\u2019s Danger, But Believes Merab\u2019s Relentless Style Will Prevail<\/p>\n

\"Merab<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve always been a big Sandhagen fan since day one. I like his attitude, I like his approach to everything. Sandhagen is dangerous, and you know this is his one opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cory Sandhagen has earned a reputation as one of the most lethal strikers in the division, with vicious knockout wins over former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar<\/a> and top contender Marlon Moraes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ray Longo<\/a> followed up by saying, \u201cYou obviously can\u2019t go to sleep on a guy like Sandhagen, but I think he\u2019s only got one way to get Merab out of there. He\u2019s got to slow down a freight train in front of him.\u201d With respect to both side, Ray Longo see\u2019s his fighter securing yet another title defense, becoming one step closer to being considered the greatest of this generation. <\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While making his regularly scheduled appearance on the \u201cRay Longo Minute\u201d segment of the Anik and Florian Podcast,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":175363,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-175362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}