Al Iaqunita Prepared For “A Round-And-A-Half Of Hell” Against Justin Gaethje

Former UFC lightweight title challenger Al Iaquinta’s Octagon return is set for August 25th in the main event of UFC Lincoln.

Ragin’ will take on former World Series Of Fighting (WSOF) lightweight champ Justin Gaethje. Gaethje is a scrappy lightweight who isn’t easy to put away, and continues to push the action no matter how much damage he’s in. Iaquinta knows he’s going to be in for a hard night when he shares the cage with Gaethje (via MMA Fighting):

“We got a tough task ahead of us,” Iaquinta said. “Justin Gaethje is no joke. That guy is about a round-and-a-half of hell. I gotta be ready for a round-and-a-half of absolute hell, then he starts slowing down about midway through the second round. But holy sh*t, that first round. We gotta sit, we gotta talk with (coach) Ray (Longo), get a gameplan going. This is good.

“He needs time off. That’s another advantage for me. He needs a break. I’ve had a break. I’ve been on break. I’m good, you know? Took a couple weeks off after Khabib (Nurmagomedov) just to head up everything, but, I don’t know, I think it’s not a good fight for him. I don’t think it’s a good one for him. I don’t know, take a little time, take a little time to relax [your] chin. I don’t know, you need time. He needs time.”

Gaethje started off his career undefeated at 17-0 before signing with the UFC. In his promotional debut he put on an absolute classic back-and-forth brawl with Michael Johnson which he won via second round knockout.

Five months later Gaethje was back in the Octagon against former lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez. He was rendered unconscious in the third round by a knee from The Underground King after yet another exciting back-and-forth fight. It was the first loss of Gaethje’s MMA career.

This past April Gaethje suffered yet another loss inside the Octagon, this time to Dustin Poirier via fourth round TKO. In short, Iaquinta believes that Gaethje’s relentless style of fighting has caught up with him upon his UFC run:

“I think [his style has] come back to haunt him more in the UFC than not,” Iaquinta said. “That’s like a coin toss of a style. You just go kamikaze, let’s go. I think I’m just more tactical, more gamplan-oriented. I just feel like, I don’t know — I don’t know if there’s a gameplan going into his fights.

“Does his coach talk to him about a gameplan, like, ‘This is what you’re going to do?’ Because he does the same thing every fight. There’s no difference compared to the opponents he fights, so it’s just, you’ve got to make little adjustments. At this level, there has to be those little adjustments. That’s the adjustment that Eddie Alvarez made, that’s the adjustment that Dustin Poirier made. You make adjustments at this level, you’re gonna win, and you’ve got to make the right adjustments at the right time.

“He’s got to realize. And he’s not learning anything between those fights and these fights. So I’ve gotta just show that I’m on that level. I’m better than that. I’m way better than that. So I think it’s perfect. It’s a perfect fight.”