The UFC announced on last night's episode of UFC Tonight that Carla Esparza will defend her UFC Women's Strawweight Championship against Joanna Jedrzejczyk at UFC 185 Mar. 14 at American Airlines Center in Dallas. This fight will co-headline with Anthony Pettis defending his UFC Lightweight Championship against Rafael Dos Anjos. Joanna is the first Polish fighter to get a UFC title shot. She is a former European Muay Thai champ. As we have seen in her fights to date, Joanna can really punch. But she is also very well coached and as we saw in her win over Claudia Gadelha, she has excellent ground defense. And it was her defense and that one knockdown at the end of round one that won her that fight by split decision. Carla is an All American wrestler who has improved over the last couple of years and she navigated the land mine that is TUF 20 to win this championship. She knows that Joanna could knock her out. She will want to take Joanna down. But to win, she has to do more than just score takedowns. For me, the big question mark about Joanna is does she have the endurance to go five rounds as she's never done that before. If she goes for the big KO and doesn't get it, can she pace herself over five rounds. And on the flip side, Carla could gas out going for takedowns and leave herself open for the big punch. I'm looking for an epic fight from these two elite athletes. And I think this shows that the Strawweight division will be very competitive as there are several challengers waiting in the wings. Remember that most fans hadn't heard of Joanna until recently.
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