Kenney eyes MMA hardware

“Oh, I’m walking away with that belt,” Casey Kenney said.
He followed the statement with a laugh.
But he’s not joking around. He’s serious. He fully expects to walk out of Tachi Palace Fights 28 as the champion.
Kenney, a 2008 Jay County High School graduate, will fight veteran Jared Papazian in the co-main event Thursday for the mixed martial arts promotion’s vacant flyweight title. The bout is eighth on a slate of nine that begin at 9 p.m. EST at Tachi Palace Hotel and Casino in LeMoore, California.
“It’s going to feel great,” said Kenney, anticipating a victory in his first championship bout. “I can’t wait.”
After his most recent, a first-round submission of Angel Hernandez, Kenney (5-0) was hoping to fight for the TPF title by the end of 2016.
The plan was for him to have one more fight, this month, in preparation for his big opportunity, with the championship bout slated for November. But the 135-pound title fight that was slated to be part of the main event Thursday — the other half pits lightweight champion Tony Llamas (16-15) against Danny Navarro (15-6) — was pushed back by champion Cody Gibson for family reasons, and multiple opponents turned down offers to fight Kenney in non-title bouts.
With Kenney needing an opponent and TPF in search of a second championship fight, everything fell into place. Organizers booked the fight — Kenney vs. Papazian, a 28-year-old veteran — for the flyweight title that Adam Antolin vacated to take part in “The Ultimate Fighter” on FOX.
“I’ve been competing since I was a little kid,” said Kenney, who was a world-class judo athlete in his youth and a two-time state medalist in wrestling for the Patriots. “Everything I’ve done … has prepared me for a moment like this.”
It will be a different kind of fight for Kenney, who has mostly made quick work of other young fighters who have a combined record of 8-17.
Papazian is a seasoned fighter with 31 professional bouts — 19 victories — since he started his career in 2008. He is a former King of the Cage flyweight champion and TPF bantamweight champion, and his career includes three UFC fights, all losses.
The different level of opponent, though, has not led Kenney to alter his approach.
“I haven’t changed a whole lot,” he said. “What I’ve been doing has been working for me. … But it’s definitely been more intense training getting ready for five rounds.”
The biggest difference in fighting someone with experience, he said, is that they’re not going to fold easily.
“I have to stay patient,” he explained. “Experienced guys, they’ve been in bad positions before. Inexperienced guys tend to just give up and let whatever happens happen. With experienced guys, you can never count them out of a fight ever until it’s over.”
Kenney’s last two fights have been over quickly as he submitted Anthony Torres with an armbar in February and Hernandez with a Brabo choke, both in less than two minutes. In all, he has three professional wins by submission, one by technical knockout and one by unanimous decision following a 6-0 amateur career.
He sees winning the TPF championship as a step that could open doors for him. Three of the last five TPF flyweight champions have left the promotion to try their hands in UFC, considered the top of the mountain in mixed martial arts.
Kenney’s unabashed confidence that he will win Thursday is not mere bravado, nor an indication that he’s overlooking Papazian as an opponent. Rather, it’s a belief in his skills and training built over more than two decades of experience in combat sports.
“Honestly, there’s only one other 125-pound man in this world that I was afraid to fight, and he retired,” he said referencing his coach, Chris Cariaso. “Right now I’m just confident in my skills. Everything is sharper than ever.
“Especially in this fighting world, if you don’t have a little bit of confidence, you might as well count yourself out before it even starts. I train with some of the best guys around.
“I think as long as I perform well I’m going to be hard to beat.”