“Where we grew up, everybody was a fighter to begin with: Growing up in South Central, you either knew how to fight or you definitely would be preyed upon by a lot of people,” says Savant Young. “So that was just one way to establish yourself on the block and make sure nobody would try to take anything from you. And when it was time, you had to be ready, because you never knew when that was going to come about.”

Now living in Pasadena, California, Savant says his first fighting art was Shotokan karate.  Then while still growing up, he started getting into western boxing, before adding Wing Chun kung fu to his repertoire. “I primarily grew up striking and then started working on the ground stuff because we need to know how to do it.”

Savant quickly made a name for himself on the MMA circuit after knocking down most of the game opponents in his path. Along the way he picked up the nickname ‘Black Superman’. “That’s not really my nickname, but they just named me that for the night because I hit a guy (Danny Suarez) with a nice punch – the superman punch, and I’m black – so they figured it went hand-in-hand. It’s okay, I don’t mind. I accept it if it will help anybody to remember me,” laughs Young.

During many of Savant’s bouts, he hasn’t had the chance to display his submission techniques because his opponents are unconscious before they get to the canvas. But Young says he is comfortable fighting on the ground as well: “Very much so. Most of my wins came from submissions, but I’d definitely much rather stand and punch it out because that’s a clear-cut way to win a fight, but I just take it as it comes.”

Savant, how did you come to be with the Sabres?

“I knew the coach, Ken Yasuda; I’ve been on him for a little while, and he’s a real good guy. He’ll help out with some conditioning of friends that I know, and he just approached me with the idea: He figured that I’d be a good asset to the team. And I definitely didn’t want to pass up the opportunity at all.”

In an interview with Knucklepit.com last year, Ken said not to worry about the way the Sabres had been going: He was coming back with an all-star team in 2007. And that’s the case, isn’t it?

“Oh, yeah, we come to bang, man. We’re a team that’s going to put it all out there on the line, and we’re going to play the game hard.”

Do you train with the other team members?

“We were training with each other prior to this team being formed, so it was a blessing that it all worked out this way. We can all train and be compensated the same way; it’s a real nice family atmosphere as far as our group is. We train together and may have even had fights with each other in the past – we’re definitely a good group of guys.”

I don’t imagine you get to train with Kazuhiro Hamanaka much, because he’s based in Tokyo.

“Yeah, but he’s been staying here a bit. He’s been staying at Antonio Mckee’s house. Antonio opened his house to Kaz so he could train with us for this fight, and if he wants to stay out here, we’ll definitely support him and he’ll have a place to stay for as long as he wants to be here. But as for all the other guys on the team, we’ve all been training together.”

What grappling have you done?

“I’ve done some BJJ… I used to train at Gokor Chivichyan’s, so I did some sambo and wrestling. And now with Antonio McKee, I’ve started to learn to do basic collegiate wrestling. But I did start out doing BJJ.”

While you were with Gokor, did you train with Gene Labelle as well?

“I worked out with Gene Labelle some, and some with Gokor. I was not really like a floater, but I would drop in and a lot of people would see my potential, so all these people have helped me out in the past and I’ve taken things from everywhere I’ve been. It’s all helped me to get to this point right now.”

Do you study tapes of your opponents?

“I’ll watch a fight to see how to impose certain things, or to see how they’ll react to things, but as far as studying every person: I don’t really need to because I figure if you do that, you’re going to kinda expect a certain thing out of them. And if you don’t get that, you might not have the plan to counter what they are doing. So I don’t like to get set in that habit. I try to work on what this sport entails – what MMA consists of, and if you’re professional, you should be able to fight all ranges of the sport.”

Do you expect anything in particular from Ed West, or will you, as you say, take it as it comes?

“I’ll take it as it comes. I don’t truly expect him to want to trade punches with me - that’s not really smart for anybody. If he does, I’ll be ready to trade punches with him, and if he wants to go down to the ground and work submissions, I’ll most definitely be ready to do that with him as well. So it will be a real good fight. I’m an athlete; I’m not a brawler. I have nothing against him, I’m just there to play the game and the better man will win.”

With your reputation for having such incredible KO- power, do you think Ed will want to take you down straight away?

“I would assume he would try that, but you never can tell. With saying that, he might think that I’m going to be really prepared to defend the takedown, and he may throw a kick to my head, so there’s always the possibility for him to try that as well. But I do think if I get a good punch in, the fight won’t go long at all.”

Will your bout go past the first round?

“If I can get a good punch in, I don’t think it will at all. But I’m definitely prepared to go the distance of the fight; I’ll take it in the first round or the last two seconds of the third round – it’s fine by me.”

Savant, is there anything you’d like to add?

“I would definitely like to thank the IFL for giving me the opportunity, and for recognizing that we’ve definitely got a good team, and giving the guys on our team a shot to get out there and do what we do. Just watch out for the Sabres because I know everybody’s really eager to see what we’re going to be this year – after the performance last year. I can assure you that we’re definitely going to be a night-and-day difference from what it was before.”

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