Yair Rodríguez is a Mexican mixed martial artist and Taekwondo black belt currently competing in the Featherweight division of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). He is ranked #7 in the official UFC featherweight rankings, and was the featherweight winner of The Ultimate Fighter: Latin America.
He rose to fame in his last UFC fight when he dsimantled former UFC champion and BJJ world champion BJ Penn.
He won the one-sided fight via TKO in the second round and was awarded a Performance of the Night bonus.
Rodríguez is expected to face Frankie Edgar on May 13, 2017 at UFC 211.
Rodriguez recently had a live AMA with his fans and he was asked about his ground game. He is a BJJ white belt but doesn’t consider that to be important in MMA:
My ground game is good. You guys probably think that my ground game is not good but I train with the best, with black belts. In MMA it doesn’t matter what belt you have. I mean, I’m a white belt and I roll only with black belts. It doesn’t matter if you have a Gi on or a belt. This is a different game when you roll with strikes. Whenever you can punch or elbow, it doesn’t matter who you are on the ground. If you can’t take an elbow on your face, it doesn’t matter if you can choke someone.
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