Danny Sabatello had “a hell of a year” in Japan, going 2-0 under the RIZIN banner with wins over Shinobu Ota and Shoko Sato to set up a title bout with bantamweight champion Naoki Inoue. They will collide
for the gold on the New Year’s Eve show in Saitama, and “The Italian Gangster” feels “so f*cking pumped” with the opportunity to close out the year with a belt around his waist.
And Sabatello has no intention to slow down if he gets the title. After competing seven times in just over two years as a Bellator fighter, he makes a bold prediction for 2026.
“A lot of people, once they get the belt, they kind of tame off and they kind of get a little relaxed and they don’t fight,” Sabatello told MMA Fighting. “No. To me, I’m going to want to defend my belt seven times next year. I’m going to want to defend it overall throughout my career, 87 times. It’s going to be absolutely amazing. And it’s going to be nothing short of just absolutely incredible throughout my entire career in RIZIN, which is going to be a long time.”
“Yeah, 87 is a lot of times, but you know what? I might even want to go even more than that,” he continued. “87 is a lot. It’s never been done before, but I like doing things that have never been done before. You know what? I’m a special guy. I know what I train at the best gym in the world. And this is all I do. You know, all I do is fight. All I care about is fighting. I don’t have hobbies. Hobbies are for average people. I’m not average. I go out to the best gym and I train twice a day, every single fucking day. So as long as I stick to my shit and I listen to my coaches and I train hard, then of course I’m going to be special. I just got to keep doing that and I can absolutely defend it 87 times.”
Inoue has never been stopped in 24 professional bouts, racking up a 20-4 record with two defenses of his bantamweight throne so far. He competed three times as a flyweight in the UFC between 2017 and 2019, beating Carls John de Tomas prior to decision defeats to Matt Schnell and Sean Santella.
“I’m going to be able to finish this guy,” Sabatello said. “I could see it in his eyes that he’s weak and that he’s a p*ssy. He’s not mentally tough like me. Obviously fighters are tough in general, but when you compare a professional athlete to another professional athlete, there’s just different levels to this. To me, he breaks, he gets a little bit winded in his fights, he gets a little bit tired in his fights and that’s just perfect for a guy like me. I’m licking my chops when I see that shit. I have the best conditioning in all of them, and it’ll be on display New Year’s Eve. When I see that a guy is gonna be getting close to quitting in almost all of his fights, that’s just gonna be absolutely very entertaining for me because I’m gonna straight up dominate him and I’m gonna beat the shit out of him. And it’s gonna be great for everybody. Obviously, it’s gonna put a stamp on me winning this belt, but it’s also gonna be great for the fans because it’s always a show when somebody beats the shit out of somebody.”
“I know that he’s more of a boxer,” he continued. “He doesn’t have the best grappling. He doesn’t kick too much. He’ll sometimes throw an inside low kick on the feet. He does somewhat of a good job being in or out and uses in his footwork pretty good. He uses the jab a lot because he’s usually taller than his opponents. But with me at 5’10”, as a bantamweight, I’m one of the tallest guys in all of MMA. He’s not going to be able to use his length and his reach on me. It’ll be a little bit different. He is a little bit faster. He is a little bit quicker. But you know, when I say that, that’s compared to all the other little bitches that he’s and shitty people that he’s fought. I’m gonna be able to time him, and I think I’m gonna be able to knock him out. But if I am not able to knock him out, I’m gonna be able to submit him on the ground. Either way, I will be dominating him. I will be punishing him. I will make it a little bit bloody, and I will wanna beat the shit out of him, and put my f’*cking elbow through his skull.”
Sabatello finished Ota in his RIZIN debut back in May and then followed it up with a September split decision over Sato, and now said he would absolutely love securing the first soccer kick knockout of his career.
“I know the RIZIN fans love soccer kicks, but at the end of the day, who the fuck doesn’t love a soccer kick?” Sabatello said. “I think that would be an absolutely picture perfect scenario, but sometimes, you know, fights just get a little grimy. They don’t go exactly the way you see, but make no mistakes about it, I will be going for that soccer kick knockout just because that would mean it was the best fight of my life. What better way than to win the belt in New Year’s Eve in Japan with a soccer kick, obviously. You know what, we prepare for anything. We’re preparing for 15 hard f*cking minutes, but we don’t think it’s gonna go that long because I’m way better than this guy.”
“In terms of the ruleset as well, I think it’s perfect for me,” he added. “Obviously it’s very good for grapplers because you’re able to kick and punt and knee and stomp a downed opponent, so that kind of makes RIZIN fights a little bit more exciting than any other organization. Whereas a lot of times these grapplers are stuck in these positions in the UFC or whatever other events and they can’t really get too many strikes off because you’re limited due to the ruleset, but here in RIZIN I could do whatever the fuck I want. If I have somebody on the ground, it’s not going to be boring because I could always knee their head, I could get up and punt their face off their body. Absolutely is a home to me in RIZIN. And it’s just only going to get bigger and better and better. I’ve already kind of taken over at RIZIN and I can see that the fans already love me, but we’re just getting started. This is my first year in RIZIN and we’re going to be absolutely going nuts.”
Sabatello does lament the fact he only gets 15 minutes in the cage with Inoue, though, as RIZIN championship bouts don’t go up to five rounds as UFC, PFL and other major promotions, but he doesn’t plan on going the distance.
“If anything, this is going to help Naoki, because my conditioning is way better than his,” Sabatello said. “You know, if it was up to me, fights would be 45 minutes just because I could always wear guys out of them and break them in the end. You look at my last fight, I broke the guy in the end and usually throughout my career, I break guys if I don’t finish them. So with it being three rounds, that’s okay. Make no bounds about it. 15 minutes is still a long time when you have some motherf*cker in your fucking face trying to rip it off from the second that that bell rings. It’s gonna be a matter of time before he breaks. You know what, I might even break him in that first round with that high pressure and high pace. You see it all the time when guys get into these scrambled positions in the first round, they somewhat come up a little bit tired, and they’re just not used to it. You kind of have an adrenaline dump. With me being in his face and in the pressure, he’ll break.
“I won’t need 25 minutes to break this guy. When you have somebody with the high, high, high pressure and high, high, high pace going at you nonstop full throttle, just absolutely relentless like a dog on the f*cking bone, beating the shit out of you, punching you, kicking you, elbowing you, kneeing you, going for takedowns, taking you down, letting you up, punching you again, kicking you, taking you down again, more ground up on, it’s just too much, it’s too overwhelming, especially for a little bitch like Naoki Inoue. So 15 minutes is gonna be plenty enough time for me to play with my food, and I will get to finish.”
The Bellator veteran admits that the time difference between Japan and United States makes it harder for North American fans to watch RIZIN live, but he plans on convincing them that staying up over time is worth it. Sabatello promises fans “a treat” to make their “hard-earned money” worth it.
“For starters, it’s absolutely massive in Japan,” Sabatello said. “A lot of people in the States don’t realize how big MMA is over there in Japan. Absolutely massive. They sell out these shows, they sell out these arenas. One of my fights, the first one against an Olympic medalist in Oda was a sold out stadium dome, and absolutely dome, 50,000 people sold out, packed to the gills. So it’s absolutely massive over there, and it’s becoming even bigger over here. I think I’m their guy to make it absolutely massive over here in America too. I think people just need to watch it. Once they get a little bit of glimpse of these RIZIN shows, I think you’re gonna be hooked. I know from experience, all the people that I’ve told to watch some of the shows and check it out, they’re absolutely hooked because you don’t just have to be a fight fan. RIZIN offers something a little bit different where — obviously if you’re a fight fan, they put on very high level skill levels fights, but even if you’re not a fight fan, you enjoy just everything. They put an absolutely massive performance on every single event.
“I do know it’s a little bit tricky just with the time change, it might not ever be as big[in the U.S.] as it is [in Japan], but it’s just different when a fight card starts at 3 a.m. How do you convince people to stay up and pull an all-nighter? I think that is a little bit tricky, but outside of that, there’s no reason why RIZIN can’t be absolutely even bigger than it is. And I look forward to doing that. I think it’s my responsibility to help grow this company with me becoming the face of this company. I want to put on big, massive, absolutely stellar performances and put on big events too. I want to help build them because you know what, this is my home as well. Only bigger and better things with RIZIN. It’s obviously already massive, but we’re just going to keep growing this and I’m their guy to keep growing it.”
“When I’m constantly defending my belt and I’m their champion, I’m their guy,” he added. “I’m the face of that, it’s gonna be very good just for the market, obviously in terms of business, because that’s what this is all about. It’s gonna be good for them. They’re gonna have an American champion that’s very loud and isn’t boring, and also isn’t fake. I think something that resonates with the fans about me is when I do talk the trash, it just comes out of my mouth. I don’t have rehearsed lines. I don’t have these corny little things. This is just who I am. And the fans kind of appreciate that, especially the fans over there in Japan. They really know what they’re talking about. They really know what they’re watching. They really study the sport, they understand the techniques. It will be good for me to be the champion over there in Japan and it’ll grow the market here in America.”
