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OTTAWA, Ontario – Looking at Saturday’s co-headliner against Derek Brunson, UFC middleweight Elias Theodorou has a quite straightforward way of breaking things down.

“In many ways, our think our styles couldn’t be more opposite,” Theodorou told reporters, including MMA Junkie, at Thursday’s UFC Ottawa media day. “He’s someone who’s aggressive right off the bat, where I’m more cerebral and look to find ways to win.

“He lives by the sword and dies by the sword and it’s probably going to be a tough first 10, five minutes. But, from then, I’m going to show him the difference between chess and checkers.”

We’ll see about the chess and checkers part when they’re done with their middleweight clash, which streams live on ESPN+ from Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa. But a look at their records can attest to how differently Theodorou (16-2 MMA, 8-2 UFC) and Brunson (18-7 MMA, 9-5 UFC) approach their fights.

Brunson has only been past the first round four times in his UFC career. And while quickly dispatching opponents in seven of his nine UFC victories is not a bad thing, he’s also been on the losing end of three first-round knockouts. Theodorou, in turn, has needed the judges in all but two of his UFC fights. On the flip side, he’s won the vast majority of them and has never been finished in his entire professional career.

For Theodorou, the matchup tells a story of emotion vs. brains. And though he respects Brunson as an athlete, a wrestler and an MMA fighter, the is quite confident in which one will prevail.

“I think if you look at one Derek Brunson fight, you’ve seen them all,” Theodorou said. ”He in a previous life was a sprinter, in high school and college, and I think that obviously translates. But I’m going to show him the difference between a sprint and a marathon.”

The contrast is clear when it comes to their current statuses in the UFC, too. While Brunson looks to shake off a two-fight skid, after knockout losses to Ronaldo Souza and Israel Adesanya, Theodorou is riding a three-fight streak after a split-decision loss to Brad Tavares.

That makes for different stakes. While he’s fighting for a spot in the top-10, Theodorou believes his opponent is fighting for his job. That type of pressure can go both ways, but in this case Theodorou believes he’s got the mental edge.

“I’ve still got to look at that as a desperate man is a dangerous man, but he’s been fighting like he’s desperate for quite some time, right?” Theodorou said. “If you look at his wins or his losses, it’s in the first round. And part of that is, again, that sprinter mentality. He fights very emotional. Fights start about 50/50, obviously, in regard to each opponent has distance, each opponent has their barrier.

“And he almost feels compelled, out of emotion, to break that barrier. You’ve seen that in fights like the Robert Whittaker one, where he had him and he just exerted everything. Or if you look at that last one, with Israel Adesanya, he respected Israel’s striking so much that he desperately went for a takedown. He’s an emotional fighter, where I use my brain.”

Brunson has acknowledged the fact that he needs to find a “better way and smarter way” to use his knockout power and has recently moved his camp to the Hard Knocks gym in South Florida looking to help address the flaws in his game.

For his part, Theodorou thinks Brunson’s experience goes a long way, but believes that the saying that “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks” applies in this situation.

“We have the same amount of wins, essentially, after I get my hand raised,” Theodorou said. “But he has a lot more losses, a lot more KO losses. I’ve saved myself up in regard to all my chips in the wars and the battles being the smarter fighter. I’ll enter the octagon smarter and I’ll exit it smarter.”

To hear from Theodorou, check out the video above.

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