Justin Ibarrola has embarked on an unbeaten run in bare-knuckle boxing, which could culminate in BKFC gold on Friday night. On December 5th, Ibarrola battles former BKFC title challenger Ryan Reber for the vacant bantamweight belt in the co-main event of BKFC 85.
When addressing his thoughts on the resume and skillset of his fellow stalwart BKFC bantamweight contender ahead of their BKFC 135 pound championship fight, Ibarrola said [via Bare Knuckle Bowker],
“I don’t look at it as a championship fight, and I don’t mean it in any kind of disrespectful way to Reber. But just because I don’t think he’s on my level of competition, to be honest. He’s a great fighter. He can take a f**king punch. He can last the rounds. He can come back and win, you know? He definitely has that spirit, that fighter spirit. He has that grit, but other than that, I don’t think he’s been punched by anybody like me.”
“I don’t think he’s been in the ring with somebody who can move like me, who is as quick as me. Yeah, I mean, I don’t even judge him on his fight against [Alberto] Blas because I could tell he fought really scared in that fight, very intimidated. He had a lot of s**t going on in his head. And I don’t think; if he didn’t let the mental get to him, he would have definitely performed a lot better. I think, so.”
“When I prepare for Ryan, I’m not even looking at that fight against Blas. That gives me no tell, you know. I look at the other fights like, you know, [Quinton] Anthony Foye is a good fight that I look at because we both fought him and Anthony Foye is another; like he matches our style kind of. He’s kind of like a sit back, technical boxer.”
“Then I look at all the fights with the similar opponents that we have and just see; I look at reasonings for why it took him so long to stop them or I even look back at my fights and I’m like, how was I able to stop them earlier than he was? And I just look at those fine details which aren’t many.”
“Like it’s very easy to pick up for me. Like I know exactly how this fight’s going to go. But the most flowers I’ll give Ryan is that he’s durable and he has grit and he’s willing to go in there and f***ing bang it out, you know? But at the end of the day, I think I’m just going to bring in a whole different level of experience that he’s not going to be ready for.”
In regard to whether this was a prediction he wanted to divulge specifically or if he was reserved about revealing what is a more covert game plan ahead of this BKFC title bout, Ibarrola stated [via Bare Knuckle Bowker],
“I run so many different scenarios in my head to prepare myself for anything. I don’t just say oh I can see myself knocking him out in the first round because then if it doesn’t happen then and I’m not prepared for the other situations that could really mess me up. So you know I never; I’ve tried predicting my fights in the past.”
“It never goes that way [laughs]. But, you know, I never in any of my fights, I never go for the knockout. I have four knockouts. They just happen to happen. I placed the right shot. Nothing was planned. It’s just what worked out for me. So going with Ryan, you know, we’re contracted actually for six rounds if it goes the distance, funny enough. So we’re contracted for a sudden death round if it’s that close of a fight. But it’s; man, there’s no doubt in my mind.”
“There’s not a planet on this earth, there’s not a universe in the world where I even remotely think that he can beat me. So, you know, whether it’s a knockout or we do go the distance, you know, cuz I’m the type of fighter who I can dance around the ring all day long if I wanted to. I could get an easy victory. I did it in my last fight.”
Justin Ibarrola initially eyed a break from fighting, but this BKFC title offer was too tempting
Further breaking down his vision of how this BKFC bantamweight championship bout with Ryan Reber will play out in Florida, Justin Ibarrola continued [via Bare Knuckle Bowker],
“You know, my last fight I really didn’t even plan on fighting until Dave Feldman called me and said, “You have to fight him so we can potentially give you a title shot after.” So I was like, “All right, s**t, you know what? I planned on taking a break, but since you’re mentioning like a title fight and the pay is good for me, then I might as well fight.””
“So, I just went in there and I was like, “Yeah, let me just easily dance around the ring, make him miss, jab, not be too aggressive, and just get an easy victory.” It’s not pleasant to the crowd, you know? It’s not pleasant to, you know, the people watching and want to see me dominate. But it was just one of those fights where I just wanted to scratch it off and get it over with. And I knew exactly how to do that.”
“And I can do that in any fight with any opponent. I could easily go five rounds, dance around, minimize the amount of times that I get hit, and just f***ing jab, just throw straight punches at you the entire time, and make you miss. I’m fully confident that I can do that with any opponent in any fight in that ring at any time. We can go six, seven, eight rounds, and I can just do that the entire time.”