Danielle Kelly down for grappling match with Rose Namajunas in ONE Championship
It seems ONE Championship's dashing and dangerous submission grappler Danielle Kelly has been poking at the MMA world a lot lately.
The American grappling stalwart recently had an interview with prominent MMA journalist The Schmo while in LA for the ONE and Amazon Prime press conference a few weeks back.
The two spoke about Kelly's intentions on perhaps transitioning to MMA after a highly successful career in jiu-jitsu. This idea is highly likely to happen as ONE athletes are allowed to jump between the different combat sports that are showcased in the organization.
That's without mentioning that Kelly has already beaten some of the more prominent female MMA fighters in her division, including Roxanne Modaferri, Cynthia Calvillo and current UFC strawweight queen Carla Esparza in submission grappling matches.
In the conversation, The Schmo asked Kelly if she was interested in facing former UFC strawweight world champ Rose Namajunas in a grappling match. The two were previously booked to grapple some time ago, but COVID-19 forced the UFC star out.
To this, Danielle Kelly replied:
"I don’t know. I’m really happy with ONE. So if Rose [Namajunas] comes to ONE Championship, unless they do like a ONE Championship versus UFC or Bellator whatever, then I’m up for it."
If Kelly ever does face Namajunas in a submission grappling contest, it's hard to see it being competitive. Kelly is levels above world-class grappling specialists already.
MMA does use grappling but in a highly different way. If 'Thug' Rose decides to jump ship to ONE and faces the American jiu-jitsu savant, she'll be walking into Kelly's world.
Watch the full interview here:
Danielle Kelly expresses interest in facing ONE women's atomweight queen Angela Lee in the future
During the press conference, MMA journalist John Morgan asked Danielle Kelly if a move to MMA is something she's planning for the future. To this, Kelly said:
"It's definitely a possibility, but I wanna be comfortable first. So, and I also feel like I need to accomplish more in jiu-jitsu. I wanna challenge myself and [when] the time comes, it'll come."
Morgan followed up with another question on whether or not Kelly had found the opportunity yet to challenge ONE women's atomweight world champion Angela Lee to a match. Kelly replied:
"I won't be opposed to it, but I'm a jiu-jitsu person so I've been focusing on like, legit grapplers. But [if] they [ONE] were to give me that match, I'll take it in a heartbeat."
It does sting a little to hear Kelly say she's used to dealing with "legit" grapplers as if saying that the dominant ONE atomweight queen is not at her level of jiu-jitsu. Angela Lee has since fired back, and the two have been exchanging barbs ever since through various press interviews.