It turns out that the next Who’s Number One event will become something of a family affair as Nicky Ryan joins his older brother Gordon, who was already scheduled to face Matheus Diniz in the headline match. The man that the younger Ryan faces on October 2nd is actually not a BJJ competitor at all, as it’s just been revealed that he will face Tony Ramos, three-time All-American and NCAA Champion wrestler.
He won’t be the first member of the Danaher Death Squad to compete against a top-tier wrestler as Nick Rodriguez competed against Pat Downey, and Gordon fought Bo Nickal and Downey shortly after. Curiously though, this is the only time out of the aforementioned matches that the DDS member hasn’t had to concede some rule changes to the wrestler. Instead, Tony Ramos will compete against Nicky Ryan under normal BJJ competition rules for Who’s Number One events which could give the BJJ brown belt a huge advantage.
Ramos was an accomplished wrestler from a pretty young age, setting records for Glenbard North High School and becoming a three-time Illinois state champion. At the University of Iowa he garnered plenty of success in the NCAA championships and followed this up with helping the US team win two World Cup silver medals, one in the same year that he outwrestled Olympic and future UFC champion, Henry Cejudo to win 12-8.
Despite his elite wrestling pedigree, Ramos will have a mountain to climb at Who’s Number One as he comes up someone who’s already established himself against the best BJJ has to offer. Nicky Ryan stormed through the last edition of the ADCC trials by submitting Kade Ruotolo, Richard Alarcon and Keith Krikorian in one day to book his place at the 2019 ADCC World Championships. He’s also featured heavily for Polaris, beating both the legendary Masakazu Imanari and UFC Hall-of-Famer Urijah Faber on their mats.
The full Who’s Number One event will be streamed live on FloGrappling on October 2nd, click here to subscribe and watch.
