Few weeks after signing the contract with ONE Championship promotion Gordon Ryan got his first opponent.
IBJJF no-gi Champion, multiple Eddie Bravo Invitational (EBI) champion, and three times ADCC world champion, Gordon Ryan (25), will face Japanese MMA legend, Shinya Aoki (38) in an open-weight grappling super match.
The bout between Ryan and Aoki is set for Aug. 27, while the city and venue have yet to be determined.
This news was first published by ONE Championship’s CEO Chatri Sityodtong on this Twitter account.
While anyone in Jiu-Jitsu who’s following Ryan will find this match as pretty unusual and easy task for Ryan it seems like ONE FC don’t think so when Aoki is in question as Aoki is well known for accepting the fight against opponents who have a great size advantage over him.
In this bout, Shinya Aoki will weigh 50 pounds, or even more, less than Gordon Ryan.
If we take a look at Aoki’s MMA career we can notice that he won a lot of his fights with submissions. However, in his Submission Grappling Career, he fought Garry Tonon in 2017. Despite the fact that early in the match Aoki was controlling the fight against Ryan’s teammate, he lost the match via Heel Hook Submission.
Although a lot can change in 4 years we still think Ryan has a big advantage in this match as his main focus is on grappling while Aoki is primarily an MMA fighter.
Aoki is currently on a 4 win streak in MMA, and Ryan’s last matches in grappling were against Vagner Rocha and Roberto Jimenez at the Who’s Number One (WNO) event. He won both matches via submissions.
