Johnson has a lot of trouble finding his range. He doesn't land very often when he has to lead, he gets most of his work done when the other guy comes to him in a shitty position. That's not a good sign against someone with the reach and jab of Gustafsson. Especially when you consider that Rumble is very open to body shots. His defense is pretty much just to shell up and stand in place, maybe throw back a right hand or left hook. But Arlovski landed some hard shots to his midsection, and Rumble gassed in the third round of that fight. That's also not a great sign against Gus, who is a good body puncher, has good cardio, and is good at mixing it up high and low.
Rumble does have that ridiculous power...if he can land it. When you look at who he's actually knocked out, it's guys like Mike Kyle (20-12, has been knocked out 6 times), Esteves Jones (8-7, has been knocked out 5 times) DJ Linerdman (16-9, knocked out 3 times), and a bunch of welterweights. Generally guys who didn't really belong in the cage with him in the first place.
Gus is a big step up in competition for him. His best opponent so far was probably Phil Davis. And yea yea Davis subbed Gus 5 years ago, that's his thing. He outgrapples guys who he has a big skill advantage over, but Rumble is a good wrestler and Davis was never a threat to him (or most guys) on the feet. Next to him it's Arlovski, who would have had a good shot at beating Johnson if it was a 5 round fight. Arlovski had success both hitting the body as I mentioned before and kicking against Rumble. He had him tired and was starting to put some shots together in the third round, but ran out of time--partly because Rumble did some stalling on the cage.
Gus is the best striker Rumble has fought since Belfort a few years ago. He's got reach, size, strength, cardio, durability, a great jab and versatility. Rumble has speed, power, explosiveness, a good kicking game and wrestling. Gus has dealt with those things before. Manuwa also had speed and explosiveness, Shogun and Thiago Silva also had power, Jones had the wrestling and kicking game, etc.
I expect a tough first few rounds. Gus will probably get countered hard a few times in round 1 or 2, especially if he misses that uppercut of his. However, I also expect Gus to be doing work with his jab, especially his body jab. I think he'll be able to wear Rumble down and over time start getting Rumble to drop his hands. That's when he'll feint low and come upstairs with his left hook, then jab high and throw his right hand to the body. Work up and down, throw some kicks if Rumble insists on playing that game, and eventually take over the fight. The championship rounds should be all Gus, Johnson has never gone 5. And neither guy has ever been stopped by strikes, so I don't really see that happening unless Gus puts him away late.
