Ray “All Business” Wood’s last mixed martial arts bout marked a comeback, his second-round TKO of Gabriel Baino in September evidence of a healthy return from knee surgery that had sidelined him for more than a year.
Now comes a homecoming, as Wood returns to Maine for his first fight since moving to South Carolina last fall.
The 25-year-old Bucksport High School graduate is set to make his second defense of the New England Fights’ featherweight title against World Extreme Cagefighting and Bellator veteran Anthony “Cheesesteak” Morrison in the main event of “NEF XVI” Saturday night at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee in Lewiston.
“He’s the biggest name I’ve fought so far,” said Wood, 5-0 as a professional with three knockouts and two victories by submission. “He’s going to be a tough opponent, for sure. He’s going to be strong, and he’s going to hit hard. If I can weather the storm because I feel he’s going to come right at me, if I can use my jab and footwork and stay at a distance, I think I have a good, good chance of winning this fight.”
The 26-fight card — five professional bouts and 21 amateur contests — is scheduled to start at 6:30 p.m.
Much has changed for Wood since his last fight, as he’s traded in his home base in the Bangor area for Gaffney, South Carolina, and his formative years of training at Young’s MMA in Bangor for Revolution Martial Arts — home of UFC women’s bantamweight contender Sara McMann and fellow UFC competitor Justin Scoggins — in his new locale.
“Young’s has done a lot of great things for me. I wouldn’t be anywhere right now without them,” said Wood. “But I felt I needed a little bit of a change, and this is, I feel, exactly what I needed. To walk into a new gym and have nobody know who I am or what I’ve done, I’m building from the ground up again.”
That anonymity wasn’t without its early downside.
“I was kind of mentally distraught about it at first and wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue with what I was doing because I’ve never been the new guy,” said Wood. “Here nobody knew who I was, and with these coaches you walk into the gym and tell them what you’ve done, and they look at you and say, ‘Hey buddy, that’s great, but why don’t you show me what you’re worth.’
“You have to earn your respect, but I’ve definitely done that now and feel right at home and almost back where I was when I left Young’s MMA. It’s gone really well, I have some great coaches and training partners,” he said.
Those training partners include the 125-pound Scoggins, a 22-year-old prospect from Greenville, South Carolina, who is 9-2 overall, 2-2 in the UFC.
“It’s great to be training with someone who’s at that level and who has fought at that level, and I feel pretty good working against someone like him even though he’s a little lighter than I am,” Wood said.
Wood said his transition to a new gym in a different part of the country has helped him expand his personal arsenal for combat in the cage.
“Everybody here has almost a karate-based style,” said Wood. “Their footwork is completely different, their speed is different, and they come at you from crazy angles, which is the kind of style I’ve wanted to adopt.
“It’s something Chris [Young, co-owner of Young’s MMA] always tried to implement with me, a lot of side kicks and crazy, weird angles. But it’s worked out for the best that I moved here because everybody has that style.”
Wood plans to apply that style against Morrison, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, product with an 18-10 record.
Morrison, whose last two losses came while on the WEC roster against UFC veterans Chad Mendes and Mike Thomas Brown, hasn’t fought since scoring a majority-decision victory over Kenny Foster at Bellator 108 in November 2013 in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
The 30-year-old Morrison (18-10) had two scheduled bouts cancelled last year.
“To me this fight is a win-win situation,” said Wood, who won the NEF 145-pound crown in July 2013 with a 61-second stoppage of Canadian Lenny Wheeler at Darling’s Waterfront Pavilion in Bangor.
“This guy’s been in there with the best of the best. He’s fought some of the best guys in the world — Mike Brown, Chad Mendes, guys who have been title holders in the WEC and fought in the UFC. He’s had his time in the big show, and I feel this is my time to make my opportunity toward that goal.”
Wood said this is the final fight of his current NEF contract, and while he indicated he wouldn’t mind returning to Maine to defend his championship belt again, he admits looking forward to the opportunity to test his abilities against some of the top fighters in the Southeast — with an eye toward ultimately testing his talents against the top MMA practitioners in the world.
