Garry “The Lion Killer” Tonon will compete live in North American primetime for the first time under the ONE Championship banner this Friday, January 13. The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu legend is set to trade leather with fellow American star Johnny Nunez in a featherweight mixed martial arts brawl at ONE Fight Night 6: Superbon vs. Allazov on Prime Video, and he’s excited to put on a show under the bright lights once again.

Having a crowd of your countrymen watching you perform may serve to intimidate an athlete or cause them take a different approach, but Tonon sees no reason to stray from his core beliefs of what he thinks a fighter in his position should do.

Gary Tonon intends to put up a delighting show for the audiences

“Maybe there are more eyes from the U.S. audience watching now than there would have been in some of our previous events, but it doesn’t change much for me because a part of what I believe is important as a professional is putting on exciting fights,” he said. “So, I want to showcase my skills. I want to try to outclass my opponent technically and aggressively.”

“I want to put on an aggressive and skillful show for the fans. I don’t want to make a boring fight that nobody wants to watch.”

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After creating a name for himself as one of the most dangerous grappling practitioners in the world and racking up multiple BJJ World Titles, Tonon inked a deal with ONE Championship in 2017. In his promotional debut, the featherweight star featured in the promotion’s first-ever submission grappling battle against Japanese MMA legend Shinya “Tobikan Judan” Aoki.

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“The Lion Killer” emerged victorious after he forced a tap from the former ONE Lightweight World Champion via a heel hook halfway through the scheduled 15-minute round match. Following that impressive performance, Tonon switched his focus to MMA. His world-class groundwork helped him in the all-encompassing sport, and he enjoyed a perfect 6-0 run from 2018 to 2020.

Gary Tonon is all set to dominate after a few untoward fights

Unfortunately, he didn’t have time to utilize his bread and butter when he met then-ONE Featherweight World Champion Thanh Le at ONE: LIGHTS OUT last March, as he fell to a devastating knockout early in the first round. The American star also suffered a quick defeat at the hands of teen BJJ phenom Tye Ruotolo when he returned to submission grappling at ONE 157 two months.

But now, fresh from that loss, “The Lion Killler” is ready to take the featherweight MMA division by storm once again. And to do that, he plans to approach his upcoming fight more methodically by packing ruthlessness and patience into each strike.

“I don’t want to be an idiot. But that doesn’t mean that I can’t have an exciting fight. Some people have exciting fights that have safe fights for themselves. As safe as they can manage,” Tonon said.

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“Even a guy like Mike Tyson, for example. I’m not Mike Tyson. But you’re looking at a guy like him; he was a very, very exciting fighter. But ironically, also a very safe fighter. He was swinging hard, but every time that dude swung, he moved his head, and then he swung again and moved his head. He was a very defensively sound fighter, so that’s the kind of fighter that I aspire to be – powerful, but also smart.”