Webb (photo via CFFC / Twitter)

By Kelsey Mowatt

Jonavin Webb was thrown a bit of a curveball several weeks ago, when it was announced he would fight Nathan Coy at UFC Fight Night 83 and not Bryan Barberena, but the “Spyder” clearly wasn’t fazed.

Barberena was moved from the February 21st card to UFC on FOX 18 on January 30th, after Andrew Holbrook went down with an injury. The rugged vet faced the highly touted prospect Sage Northcutt, and tapped him out in the second round.

On paper, one could certainly make the case that Coy is a different type of fighter than Barberena. Both men are known for being pressure fighters, but in the case of Coy, he’s more likely to turn to his highly developed, wrestling pedigree. The welterweight is a former, All-American wrestler, who has scored several notable wins using his takedowns and top game.

“It doesn’t affect me too much,” Webb said on a recent episode of Full Contact Fighter Radio, when asked about how the opponent change affected his preparation. “The good thing is that their both southpaw. So a lot of the stuff we’re working on was to fight a southpaw. So that kind of worked to my favor.”

“Wrestling, now that I’m fighting a wrestler, that works in my favor, because I wrestled my entire life,” added Webb. “I know Nathan’s a good wrestler, but I really believe in my wrestling.”

Anyone who has followed Webb’s rise up the welterweight ranks, knows that as he noted, he’s also a talented grappler in his own right. In addition to his wrestling abilities, the New Jersey fighter is a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

“If it did touch the ground, my jiu-jitsu’s my bread-and-butter,” Webb furthered. “So I have 100% faith in my gameplan for this fight. I think it’s even a better match-up. I really wanted to fight Bryan, but this match-up is just perfect for me.”

UFC FN 83 will be hosted by Pittsburgh’s Consol Energy Center on Sunday.