Author – Hudson Gelfand
Harry Webb (5-0 pro, 12-0 combined)
25 Years Old
Lightweight
Infinite MMA (Ballarat)
If you don’t know about Harry Webb, boy, are you in for an absolute treat. Webb is the future of the Lightweight division and has the characteristics to become a huge superstar in the sport.
A product of Head Coach John Campbell, Webb fought almost all of his amateur career at Wayne Carl’s acclaimed Demolition Series, where he was a two-weight champion, finishing all opponents in his way, barring a very tough Kim Luk in his second amateur fight. Although having garnered some hype, it was when he turned pro that Webb began to turn heads, and his stock continued to shoot through the roof exponentially.
He opened his professional career with a 3rd round RNC of an arguably higher touted amateur prospect in Ollie Schmid on Eternal, and if you didn’t realise he was special then his utter domination of another arguably higher touted (and HEX homegrown) prospect in Kaan Husmek in a fight they debatably thought they were setting him up to lose proved he was not here to muck around. Now 2-0, Webb would face (and finish) a tough Niam Stephen before his biggest test to date, where he would face a hot Abdalla Biayda for the Lightweight title, who was almost unanimously seen as one of the next guys up from Australia at the time. It wasn’t just that he beat Biayda, but the way he put him out showed that Webb had serious power, finishing in utterly brutal fashion and leaving the world at Harry Webb’s feet.
It would be remiss of me to discuss this next section of Harry Webb’s career without discussing what happened before his next fight. Having competed for all but his professional debut under the HEX banner, now being their lightweight champion, and hailing from Victoria, Webb was seen as the face of that promotion. The reality is that when you fight like Harry Webb does, there aren’t many people putting their hands up to fight you, and HEX’s new owners, in my opinion, had taken his loyalty to the promotion for granted, where they kept pushing back a fight date given they were unable to find him a fight. This is when Eternal swooped in and signed Webb to an exclusive contract, a move which shocked the Australian regional scene but one which made sense for Webb, given they had promised him 5 fights in a 12-month period (and if they couldn’t deliver, they’d have to pay him as if he had).
That same very night when Webb signed for Eternal and his whole team was known to be up in Sydney for the event, their gym in Ballarat was firebombed and a lot of Webb’s belts & medals from past fights were also stolen. While there haven’t been any criminal prosecutions, there have been allegations & insinuations made in the community linked to the timing of Webb’s exit from HEX with the destruction of the gym. ‘Who done it’ aside, this was not only a highly stressful event that was targeted to destroy the gym, but one that aimed to disrupt Webb and any preparations he would have for his upcoming fight on Eternal. Webb and the team at Infinite would train at a secret location, which was a small rented space, and made do with what equipment they had to try to ensure as minimal an impact to his preparation as possible.
Webb would be booked against tough grappler David Martinez for the Eternal Lightweight title, but after Martinez had issues with his weight cut, the fight was cancelled, and the highly touted Kevin Kophammel stood up on short notice. I was fortunate to see this one live in Perth, and it’s by far and away the best fight I’ve ever seen live, and arguably one of the best I’ve ever seen period. These boys came to throw down, exchanging massive shots with incredibly high volume for all 25 minutes in a jaw-dropping fight, all despite Webb breaking his jaw still early in the 4th round. This fight truly was a testament to the human spirit, and I genuinely feel fortunate to have been able to see it live.
That type of fight isn’t one in which you walk away unscathed, though, and Webb didn’t only have to deal with his broken jaw, but the real battle started after because post-surgery, he developed facial palsy, an issue which causes paralysis on one side of your face. It left Webb needing to completely retrain that side of his face, needing to relearn simple things like smiling and speaking clearly. Unfortunately, it’s an issue that forced him to turn down a Contenders Series shot this year, but undoubtedly, as soon as he’s ready, he’ll be right back in the same spot.
To say Harry Webb has fought through adversity is an understatement on so many levels. We’ve consistently seen his dogged spirit shine through when called upon. Be it in the cage winning with a severely broken jaw, or outside of it with the Infinite MMA Firebombing and dealing with facial palsy, both Webb and his team have faced every obstacle thrown their way head-on and should be incredibly proud of the resilience they’ve shown in what has been an incredibly tough period.
From a skills perspective, Webb is a slick striker with a karate-based style where he pops in and out of range. On the feet, he is an absolute standout with a deep bag of tricks that inflict hard, fight-ending damage on opponents. Webb chains together beautiful, long combinations that often catch out opponents defensively, and builds off that volume to chip away at his opponents until he’s able to land a fight-ending shot. This volume in question is foundational to Webb’s game, and the constant pressure that this creates can frazzle opponents and make them almost like a deer in the headlights. Webb does a very nice job of manipulating angles when getting off his strikes, and utilises his footwork effectively to not only position himself to land damage, but also keep himself safe defensively. His ability to grapple is, in my opinion, underrated because he hasn’t had the chance to show it off properly, but when required, he’s shown he has a strong understanding of the fundamentals and can force his way back to his feet. It will be interesting to see how he’d fare against a pure grappler, although with that said, when he’s done that before, he’s just knocked them out often before it really even got there, and I don’t think I should hold it against him for finishing them off too quickly
Any questions of Webb’s gas tank and ability to fight through adversity were answered entirely in full in his fight against Kevin Kophammel, where not only did he land I believe it was something like well over 300 strikes, but he also ate well over 200 coming back the other way a large portion of which were through a severely broken jaw. While people may question his striking defence if he’s eating 200 shots, in the context of the fight, Kophammel had to walk through the fire and eat some utter piss missiles to land his shots – not many people could’ve done that. Where the questions will come in are around how he responds to everything that’s happened outside of the cage since his last fight, but if there’s anyone you can feel confident to bet on to be resilient through adversity, it’s Harry Webb.
I adamantly believe that with his style on the feet, Webb has all the minerals to become a superstar of the sport. His striking is genuinely a beauty to behold, and his personality is sure to win over a lot of fans on the global stage. The heights Webb could attain are unknowable, and it’ll be incredibly exciting to watch his progression through the Lightweight division