“I have big hands,” Cain said. “Once I touch it, it's over. If you watch Mullikin's game, nobody touches him, he just runs away. I go at him.”
The 32-year-old took just two minutes to dispatch social media rival Mamadou Kamara in their kickboxing showdown at ONE Fight Night 23 on Saturday.
It was Kamara's first time competing in the sport and a completely different standard of competition to what fans at Bangkok's Lumpinee Stadium are used to seeing, but Kane said he was just happy to be able to shut up his compatriot.
“I trained hard. If you train hard, it's easy to fight,” he said. “I respect him, but we're not on the same level. He talks too much.”
Although both fighters have large social media followings in Senegal and are established stars in ONE Championship, Cain believed the win would boost his reputation back home.
“Everyone in Senegal watched this fight,” he said. “I was very happy to fight this guy. Everybody knows this guy.”
Saturday's match was an easy morning assignment, but taking on the unbeaten Russian will be an entirely different challenge.
“My biggest fight was Buchecha (Almeida), he was at the top level. This is not such a big fight.”
Cain defeated Almeida, known as Buchecha, by decision at ONE Fight Night 13. He earned a $50,000 performance bonus after three back-and-forth rounds with the Brazilian.
This was Kane's final fight under his ONE Championship contract, and it took several months for the two sides to come to terms on a new deal. After a lengthy absence, Kane was happy to be back in the ring over the weekend, even if it was a kickboxing bout rather than an MMA match.
Fans love a bad-mouthing heavyweight boxer, and Muhammad Ali started telling people he was the greatest long before he actually proved it in the ring.
Cain seems to have taken a page from the legendary boxer and is not afraid to exaggerate his own abilities or belittle his opponents.
He had been slamming Malikin for months and demanding to fight the champion, but his final message to the Russian was simple and harsh.
“I'm going to kill you, Mullikin,” he said.
