Rising Star Phil Davis Says It'll Take Him 8 Years To Become Good At MMA

From UFC.com:

"It was a matter of my needing that time off not to get ready for a fight, but to just train everything and learn MMA as a sport, to get good at everything," he says. "I approach everything analytically. I read somewhere that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to master something. I did the mental math – I train twice a day for two hours each, five days a week. Then for two hours on Saturday. There are fifty two weeks in a year. That means it will take me about eight years to really get good at MMA, until I can become like someone like Anderson Silva, a master. So I just have to put in the work and then hope that some of my natural ability will give me time and a half like a union worker (laughs)."

It's a very good piece on Davis and does a good job of describing his mindset for MMA.  The guy is clearly a student of the game as evident in his performance against Brian Stann.  However, he'll be facing another undefeated fighter at UFC 112 in Alexander Gustafsson(9-0) with 7 TKO/KO's to his credit. 

The UFC light heavyweight division is on fire right now with the hype behind Jon Jones, and the hype is clearly justified right now.  Ryan Bader is in the mix as well as he's an undefeated prospect as well.  However, I expect the hype wagon for Phil Davis to jump out the gates pretty soon and it just might happen at UFC 112.  I was very impressed with his performance against Brian Stann.  His ability take Stann down, control him, and flow with the transitions to almost submit him at the end of the fight.  Once he gets his striking ability up to par with the rest of his game, he'll be a handful for any light heavyweight out there. 

SBN coverage of UFC 112: Invincible