Din Thomas, Tyron Woodley and Mixing the Martial Arts

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Tyron Woodley will attempt to successfully defend the Ultimate Fighting Championship welterweight title for the fourth time in the UFC 228 main event. With No. 1 contender and interim champion Colby Covington recovering from nasal surgery, Woodley faces the unbeaten Darren Till on Saturday at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.

Longtime Woodley mentor Din Thomas figures to have the best seat in the house.

“I can’t give away too much,” Thomas said.

Till stands three inches taller than Woodley, and while he uses distance well, the rangy Englishman will not have a reach advantage. Some have compared him, at least physically, to Stephen Thompson -- a man who failed to unseat Woodley on two different occasions.

“I don’t think he’s tougher to prepare for than [Thompson],” Thomas said. “I think ‘Wonderboy’ was one of the [most difficult] opponents we’ve ever had to prepare for, based on his skill set.”

It has not been as difficult to find sparring partners to mirror Till’s approach, but Thomas admits “The Gorilla” poses plenty of challenges beyond size and distance.

“A lot of people think just because he’s big that’s his advantage,” Thomas said. “He’s a very good fighter, he moves fast [and] he’s got a dynamite left hand. These are all things we have taken into account, and we understand what he is capable of.”

Thomas sees several ways Woodley can attack Till and cut through his powerful striking and length. They have not focused their strategy in any one direction, choosing instead to smartly blend together all possible avenues to victory.

“It’s just a matter of how you are able to combine them and make them work for you,” Thomas said.

Woodley has All-American wrestling skills at his disposal, along with potent standup that features lightning-fast hands and devastating low kicks.

“He grapples well, he’s got tremendous combinations and hand speed [and] he moves well, so he doesn’t have to rely on his wrestling,” Thomas said. “It’s just that he has it, and he can always go to that.”

Unbeaten across his past six outings, Woodley utilizes his wrestling primarily as a defensive technique to keep fights standing. Low kicks to the calf have become a popular tool for many fighters under the American Top Team umbrella -- an approach spearheaded by former World Extreme Cagefighting champion Mike Thomas Brown. One of the gym’s foremost members, Thomas respects Brown’s push and finds value in the technique for Woodley.

“A lot of people don’t really know how to deal with that. They try to check [the kick], but you really can’t check that,” he said. “[Low kicks are] something that [Woodley] never really had to go to. Now in this fight, hopefully we don’t have to get there, but if it comes, we’re going to use it, too.”

Devising a game plan may be simple enough, but employing it is another matter altogether. Fight IQ has always been one of Woodley’s strengths, a fact that often goes overlooked because of his overwhelming physical tools.

“Tyron is an extremely intelligent fighter, and he’s going to do what he has to do in order to win,” said Thomas, pointing to recent title defenses Thompson and 2007 Abu Dhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling World Championships gold medalist Demian Maia.

“You saw it with the [Thompson] fights. Nobody was able to do ‘Wonderboy’ the way he did,” he said. “You saw it with Demian Maia; he was the first guy to do Maia like that. Colby Covington and Kamaru Usman were able to take his blueprint and utilize it [against Maia].”

Woodley, now 18-3-1, underwent surgery on his right shoulder in December. He had previously undergone a procedure on his left shoulder, and Thomas believes those issues have forced the champion to become more well-rounded as a striker. After his first surgery, Woodley focused heavily on his right hand and has done the same with his opposite hand this time around.

“I think it’s a blessing in disguise that he had the shoulder surgery,” Thomas said, “and now he has a lot more confidence in his left hand, and he’s going to be able to put combinations together better.”

After a feud with Covington picked up steam throughout 2017 and into 2018, Thomas thought he had a read on Woodley’s next opponent. However, Covington did not recover from his own health issues in time to compete at UFC 228. Thomas confessed he was disappointed that the fight did not materialize.

“I’ve wanted the Colby fight for different reasons. Part of it is Colby earned it,” he said. “I’m not necessarily a fan of how he got there, but he earned it. He talked his way, but he also fought his way.”

Thomas has been part of the sport for more than 20 years and understands the business side of it. As such, he harbors no ill will towards fighters like Covington who push and often break the boundaries of decency in order to get what they desire.

“I’m not opposed to the direction that the game has gone, where guys are talking their way into these big shots,” Thomas said. “The only thing that offends me is that they’re not very good at it.”

Thomas has been an improvisational performer for the better part of a decade and wants to see mixed martial artists improve their public speaking skills. Recently, he asked a friend and fellow improv performer to give a seminar for several fighters he trains. They are in the planning stages of turning it into a business.

“It’s something we’re probably going to invest a bit more time into and maybe develop something we can present to people,” Thomas said, “because if that’s the route [fighters] want to go, you’re going to have a much better chance and be a lot more successful if you do it well.”