Charlotte, NC — Heavyweight Karl Williams improved to 9-1 as a professional at UFC Charlotte on Saturday, care of a decision win against Chase Sherman that forced Williams to fall back on his striking.
Known as more of a wrestler, Williams, who won his way into the promotion on Dana White’s Contender Series last year, and had previously appeared on the PFL Challenger Series, was happy with how the bout played out.
“I feel pretty good, still got a little stuff to work on, but I’m learning on the job,” Williams told media outlets including Cageside Press at the Spectrum Center following the bout. “So I feel pretty good. More striking, so hopefully that looked good for you guys, instead of all the wrestling.”
“I was just trying to take it where it goes. The shots weren’t working, and I always work on my striking, so I just fell back on the striking.”
When it came time for the scorecards to be read, Williams was confident he had done enough to see his hand raised in victory.
“Yes sir, yes sir. I got the takedown in the first, and I think we were going punch for punch, I think I got a few more on him,” Williams noted. “With the takedown and the strikes landed, I felt pretty confident in the decision.”
For Williams, MMA is all about training and testing your skills. That’s something he got to do against Sherman, who despite a rough record in the UFC was the much more experienced opponent on Saturday. “No matter how many losses you have, those are still learning experiences that he has over me. I’m only now 10 fights in. So he has way more learning experience, can adjust to different things. So to get a win over an opponent with all that education in the ring is pretty good.”
As an opponent, “The Vanilla Gorilla” Sherman was more or less what Karl Williams expected, he added. “I knew he was going to be game. He hit me a good bit of times, I was like ‘Oh damn. I see why they call him a gorilla!'” The only surprise was “how hard he hits,” added Williams. “But then, it’s heavyweight.”
Watch the full UFC Charlotte post-fight press conference with Karl Williams above.
