If a fighter makes it to the UFC level, you have to assume that he or she has paid their dues to get to the big show.
Then there’s Jose Johnson, who has paid enough dues for the entire flyweight roster to make it to Las Vegas for this Saturday’s bout against Felipe Bunes.
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From several eye surgeries and relocating from Texas to Puyallup, Washington, to the over one hundred amateur fights before he even started putting together 25 bouts as a pro, Johnson has truly seen it all. And how can we forget the two appearances on Dana White’s Contender Series in 2020 and 2022 that finally stamped his ticket to the UFC?
So, if you think he’s deterred by a 1-2 start to his career in the Octagon that includes a loss in his lone appearance of 2024 to Asu Almabayev, he’s not. He’s just getting warmed up, and at 29 years old, he has plenty of time to right the ship, starting this weekend.

But before Johnson looks forward, he’s reflecting on a 2024 he describes as “a learning experience,” but one that he made work for him by coaching as he recovered from his latest (and hopefully last) surgery.
“Honestly, what keeps me sharp is being a coach,” said Johnson, who fought Almabayev last June, leaving him on the sidelines since. “I coach over at the gym that I'm at now, and holding pads for people and teaching people different techniques really makes you break it down far more than you even probably did when you were doing it yourself. So you just formulate a whole different level of technicality behind it, and people are different learners, so you have to teach in different types of styles and different type of ways, different type of stances, everything. So being able to teach that has helped me implement it into my fight game. So I think that's what keeps me really sharp, especially my mind.”
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It's obviously a good thing for the Flint, Michigan native, but his students are the real beneficiaries here, because they’re not getting taught by some guy in a strip mall who’s never done a sit-up but calls himself “Master.” They’re learning the sport from someone who has been there and done that over the years. And though he didn’t always get his hand raised, he always showed up to fight.
“I've had over a hundred fights as an amateur, so I've been put into almost every different position that you can possibly be put into,” he said. “I've seen all types of fighters, all different types of body styles, personalities, everything. I've studied the game because I've been in the game for so long. So when you have that level of experience, it's easier to keep your fighters confident in your abilities because you've seen it all. It's not me teaching something that I've seen on YouTube, it's me teaching something that I know through experience.”

He plans on bringing that experience to every fight from here on out, and while the 13-7 Bunes has seen his fair share in the fight game, Johnson still holds that edge that you just can’t buy.
“It definitely is a good feeling, and it’s a feeling of gratitude,” he said. “I didn't think that it was going to really play as big of an advantage as it has, but it definitely has as far as experience goes. I've seen everything. So it makes you very comfortable. Sometimes it almost makes you too comfortable.”
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Johnson laughs, but it’s cost him in fights before. And now, as he approaches a pivotal bout this weekend, he’s going to be all business from the time the Octagon door shuts.
“My problem is that I was working with it being too comfortable,” he admits. “But now that we've inched up on the last fight of my contract, I realize how real this s**t is, especially with me seeing everybody being cut. My children look up to me, my wife sees me work my ass off every day, so I put myself in a lot of uncomfortable positions in this fight camp and I've worked harder than I ever worked. This guy thinks I'm preparing for him and I'm not even preparing for him; I’m preparing to go through him, preparing for people like (UFC flyweight champ Alexandre) Pantoja. I worked extremely hard for this.”

And if you think that experience shows up late in a fight, Johnson corrects that notion.
“That shows up from the very beginning of the fight, to be honest,” he said. “People think it's late, but everybody's super strong, everybody's super-fast, and everybody's super snappy for about two to three minutes in the fight. Everybody is. Once you get past that mark, how do you move forward? And it was crazy because a clear example is if you look at me and Jack Cartwright. He’s from the UK never tasted defeat, and he's starching dudes and knocking people out. Then he fights me, and I completely outclassed, outgrappled and outstruck him. He was broken in the first round. They showed the corner cam, and his corner said, ‘You won that round.’ He said, ‘No, I didn't.’ And he was already breathing super hard. He thought he was going to outgrapple me, he thought he was going to outstrike me, and I took him down within five seconds of the first round. So just set the pace and set the tone. And that comes from experience. You take away somebody's strengths very early. They start to question themselves psychologically if they don't think it's their strengths anymore. So then you can just pick away at their weaknesses.”
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That’s the plan for Saturday night at the APEX. As for the rest of 2025, he has a plan.
“What I want to do is get in there, finish him in the first round and then turn around and fight on the Seattle card. I want to fight in front of a crowd, especially here, when I live like 40 minutes away from where the fights are being held. That'd be dope.”
UFC Fight Night: Dern vs Ribas 2 took place live from UFC APEX in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 11, 2025. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!