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UFC on Fox 7 Gilbert Melendez’s Boxing: Far from Perfect

While Gilbert Melendez was the golden boy of Strikeforce and constantly praised for his improvements in his boxing game, a closer review of his fights reveals a far more basic and flawed game than he is often credited with.Make no mistake, Melendez cou…

Make no mistake, Melendez could easily starch Benson Henderson and win the title at UFC on Fox 7—such is the nature of his punching power and accuracy—but as a technician, he leaves a lot of openings. Benson Henderson might not be the man to exploit them, but that doesn’t stop them being there.

The general consensus on Gilbert Melendez is that he struggles when an opponent turns a fight into a brawl as Josh Thomson was able to do in their three fights, but I’m not a hugely sold on that idea and it certainly isn’t the only weakness Melendez has shown.

Melendez’s fight with Jorge Masvidal said an awful lot about what he does against a fighter who keeps the distance. While Masvidal is an orthodox fighter, Melendez’s upcoming opponent, Benson Henderson, is a southpaw, and the distance which Masvidal kept between himself and Gilbert was far more like the type of distance in an Open Guard (southpaw vs orthodox) engagement. Melendez seems to make serious errors when his opponents don’t come straight at him and let him strike them.

The first thing to notice is that against Masvidal, Gilbert was constantly trying to close in with combinations ending almost exclusively with his right hand—obviously bad form when he should be “closing the door” for a counter with his left hand.

In traditional boxing, it is advised that you don’t end combinations with a right hand (with some exceptions) because the hips are square and need to be returned to half-facing to get back into position to fight.

If you end your combinations with left hands, you turn your hips back to their normal position, while keeping the opponent off you. If you end with right hands, you offer the left side of your head up on a platter with nothing to dissuade the opponent from attacking it.

Check out the fight with that in mind and you will notice that it’s nearly constant. The left side of Melendez’s head is constantly in jeopardy, but most of his opponents simply let him pull it back because they are worried about defending themselves.

Against Kawajiri, literally every attack that Gilbert made ended with a right hand and with his left hand low and chin hanging out. Of course Gilbert was connecting because Kawajiri just isn’t a very good striker—though he’s convinced himself that he is—but Gilbert should still be recovering safely from these punches.

Here it is again, fortunately Melendez catches Kawajiri again because Kawajiri is constantly flailing his left. Were Kawajiri to catch the right with his forearm or elbow (crazy monkey style is probably best given the size of gloves in MMA) and come back with a right hand or left hook, Melendez would have struggled to avoid it.

Watching even his most recent fight with Josh Thomson, where Melendez proved far more willing to throw his left hook, he still ended all of his combinations with a right hand. Melendez compounds this fault by leaning forward on most of his right hands for power. A catch and pitch strategy seems tailor made for Melendez when he is chasing because he only has one power hand and doesn’t recover well after throwing it.

This is something which Benson Henderson may be in a good position to exploit because he showed against Nate Diaz that he can use distancing when appropriate and step in when it’s time to as well. Melendez’s kicks are pretty mediocre whereas Henderson is pretty comfortable from kicking range so the onus is on Melendez to close the distance.

If a fighter lets Melendez up close from the off, he’ll be happy to mix it up and throw combinations including the left hook and occasionally the 1-3-2 (jab, lead hook, rear straight) which is an especially useful combination against southpaws because it blocks their path away from his right hand. This could cause Henderson some trouble because Anthony Pettis was able to force him into his rear hand with a 3-2 and Henderson was able to do the same thing to Pettis.

Should Henderson stay at range in a Jon Jones or Anderson Silva vs a grappler frame of mind, side kicking the knee, low kicking and snap kicking, he should be able to frustrate Melendez into closing the distance with his jab to lunging right straight or double jab to lunging right

Melendez is horrifically out of position when he gets into this chasing mind set so an opponent who can pull a Machida—letting him chase them three or four times—then stop and counter could have great success.

Here it is yet again as Melendez delivers a counter punch. Notice also that he eats a jab because his right hand is so low—unable to parry or catch when his head movement fails him.

Because Melendez is such a one-sided power puncher, he has a tendency to drop his right hand when he jabs to get more swing into it. This was pretty hard to catch in stills—because it turns out Strikeforce had pretty bad camera work, always directly behind one fighter or the other—but you can see what I mean here.

Consequently when he is charging in, he is sometimes caught by strikes from opponents which a disciplined striker has no business being caught by. Kawajiri managed to kick Melendez in the head as Melendez’s right hand was down by his waist, loading up to swing.

This was more chance than a counter, but I see no reason why a southpaw such as Henderson, if he were training to throw the left hook with a right slip, couldn’t catch Melendez clean as he loaded up. The catch and pitch strategy is probably a safer bet, but if an opponent can catch him with a classical southpaw left hook counter, they could certainly cut their night’s work short.

Melendez’s stance is very narrow because he likes to bounce around and load up his right hand—this means that his left hook doesn’t have much on it and that his base is pretty easy to manipulate with kicks—both Josh Thomson and Masvidal had a good go at this.

Masvidal even used a calf kick to plant him on his backside—something we know that his next opponent, Henderson likes to do. It seems like the entire Cesar Gracie team flat-out refuses to check low kicks.

Melendez does, unlike the Diaz brothers, try to catch kicks and counter, Fedor / Igor style. When he does this, he drops his lead hand to his thigh in hopes of catching and pushes forward with a right straight.

This is another great opportunity for a right hook if an opponent can set him up with a couple of kicks and then fake it and follow with the right hook.

Henderson is pretty much the first decent southpaw striker that Melendez has faced so he will either be tentative, or trying to jam the basics down Henderson’s throat. The obvious things to look out for throughout the fight are:

– If Melendez’s starts to control Henderson’s lead hand, he’ll rip it down, duck to the same side and try to come in with the right hand.

– Melendez might try to use the jab, left hook to get to a dominant angle and land his right straight as Pettis managed to against Henderson. That’s probably the biggest threat to Henderson on the feet in this fight.

The slapping left hook that Pettis used was a great attempt to herd Henderson right into his right hand. Notice how Pettis uses the left hook primarily to hold Henderson still and get his left foot outside of Henderson’s own.

In conclusion Melendez’s game doesn’t seem nearly so varied as many pundits have made out. He seems to rely on jabbing towards his opponent and swinging his right hand almost entirely. Mixing in the takedowns he can effectively use level changes to fake his opponent out and land powerful right hands, but he hasn’t done so against many competent strikers. The best idea to beat Melendez in the standing portions is to give him distance and make him work his way in, annoying him with non-commital kicks. The significant openings to counter into are:

To catch the right hand on the left high elbow guard and counter with the right hook as he is over-committed.
To counter his dashing jabs with a hard left hook.
To fake the low kick and deliver a right hook as he tries to catch it on his thigh.

Whether Henderson will do any of these things against such a dangerous power puncher, or whether he will try to keep the fight in the clinch will be revealed at UFC on Fox 7. It is, however, safe to say that Melendez is not so much a great boxer as a craftier-than-normal power puncher.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking, and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Killing the King: Benson Henderson UFC Lightweight Champion

Those of you who have followed my work since my time at Bloody Elbow will be familiar with my Killing the King series, but it has been quite some time since I wrote a piece in this series. The Killing the King series is my attempt to hypothetically tak…

It is the great temptation of anyone in the MMA media to simply declare that a fighter was “too good” or “hungrier” to explain away any victory but this causes us to forget the very nature of fighting.

Everyone is making mistakes all the time. It is not about who is making the least mistakes, but who forces and capitalizes on the most mistakes from his opponent.

The moment we forget that and start treating Anderson Silva, Jon Jones or Fedor Emelianenko like gods, we suddenly lose sight of their humanity, their vulnerability and in fact what makes them so great. If every fighter is making mistakes—it is a case of finding these mistakes and working out which challengers are in the best position to capitalize.

I should hope I don’t have to tell my readers that men who have won UFC belts are not slouches and most (with rare exceptions such as Brock Lesnar) have truly been tested by a wide selection of opponents on their way there. Most have fought at least one good striker, one good wrestler, a dangerous puncher and so on.

Yes, it will take a lot more than “will to win”, “wanting it more” or “scary power” to commit divisional regicide in any of the UFC’s weight classes. This series is as much for my own enjoyment than that of my readers—it is simply fun for me to examine the greatest fighters in the world with a fine tooth comb—but I hope my readers can get some enjoyment out of this too.

Being Benson Henderson

With two successful title defenses already in the bag, Benson Henderson is well on the way to being remembered as one of the best in his division’s history. The two things which interest me so much about Henderson are

1) his continued improvement and his carrying a new skill or strategy into almost every fight,

2) his being yet another wrestler who has learned to kick well. This type of fighter is still rare but because of their wrestling pedigree they can open up with kicks like no-one else in MMA can afford to. Cheick Kongo kicks a lot more fluidly and dangerously than Jon Jones (watch his Muay Thai career)—but he is limited to using his mediocre boxing in MMA because he lacks ability in wrestling and jiu jitsu.

Benson Henderson’s great strengths are obvious to anyone who has seen his bouts—he can fight at a frantic pace for five rounds and has brilliant wrestling.

Furthermore he can cause a scramble seemingly whenever he is in trouble on the ground and while he sometimes misses a kick and gives away a bodylock from the back he can often channel the spirit of Kazushi Sakuraba and threaten the standing kimura to get his opponent off of him.

Henderson is a hard enough puncher to trouble his opponents on the feet but the majority of his success there comes from his movement and snappy kicking prowess. Coming from a Tae Kwon Do background, Henderson seems adept in kicking without the ‘set up step,’ which is prevalent in Muay Thai.

Henderson simply picks his leg up and snaps his shin or foot against his opponent with little in the way of telegraphing. In Henderson’s title-winning effort against Frankie Edgar, though Edgar was able to catch many of Henderson’s kicks, he often ate the power of the kick because he didn’t have the time or the warning to step in the same direction as the kick.

Henderson’s low kicks also serve as a powerful point scorer and have the power to really beat up an opponent’s stance as he did to Frankie Edgar in the opening rounds of their second bout.

As a wrestler AND a good kicker with good movement—Henderson represented a nightmare opponent for Nate Diaz. The Diaz brothers have never had much to offer wrestlers except the chance of a submission, but on the feet was where Henderson surprised many casual fans.

The Diaz brothers’ lead leg is almost always turned in, exposing the tender back of their lead leg for kicking, which will also buckle their stance and prevent them from countering. Carlos Condit received criticism when he ruthlessly exploited Nick Diaz‘s footwork in this way, but Henderson was able to do the same thing while spicing his performance with hard punches and periods of frantic striking and scrambling on the ground.

Henderson’s best punch is undoubtedly his counter right hand. Far from a banger, Henderson’s successes on the feet have come from drawing an opponent in and catching them with a short right on the snout. This could spell trouble for Gilbert Melendez for reasons I will touch on later this week…

If I could find a fault with this method it is quite simply that Bendo doesn’t have many ways of drawing his opponent on this counter punch. Against Frankie Edgar he continually showed a backhanded jab with no hope of connecting—in order to get Edgar to come back at him.

A few great southpaws have used a slapping, backhanded jab in order to give the opponent a parry and invite a returned jab. That is when they counter. In the case of Naseem Hamed, he would lean back and land a right hook over the opponent’s counter jab. In the case of star of the moment, Guillermo Rigondeaux–a counter left straight as at 2:50 of the video below.

Henderson would simply withdraw his right hand while retreating and land a good jab on Edgar’s snout. Despite being a fighter who is touted as having great head movement, Edgar has shown to have trouble with linear punches against his last two opponents. While he moves constantly—Edgar must always enter on a straight line, and he can often be forced to eat a shot as he does so.

What flaws can be seen in the obviously well rounded game of Benson Henderson then?

Ringcraft

As always the issue of ring craft is an important one. While Henderson often uses footwork to get out of the way of strikes, he does not always show the best awareness of where he is in the cage. Often he will find himself in an exchange near the fence and not have anywhere to retreat.

Clay Guida was able to drop Henderson in one such exchange, and Frankie Edgar was able to do the same in their second bout.

one exploited the weaknesses in Henderson’s cage placement quite as well as Anthony Pettis, the last man to defeat Henderson. Most folks should know by now that Pettis loves to pressure an opponent towards the fence.

Not only did Pettis land his magnificent rebounding kick off the cage, but he often uses the cage to take away one direction of movement from an opponent so that he can attempt a spinning back kick or another power strike. Pettis will also attempt to force a shot from the opponent and look to catch them with a hard knee.

Against Henderson, Pettis backed the WEC champion towards the cage, then took a step back and allowed Henderson to attempt to fight his way out from the fence with punches—then countered with strikes of his own.

It is not coincidence that Pettis ends up in position to use his spectacular techniques – he will physically push an opponent towards the cage if he has to (as he did with Donald Cerrone—or use a push kick to get them there, as he did against Henderson.

As with many of the facets I look at in this series—it is hard to tell how Henderson’s ring craft has come along since these issues because it has not really been tested.

Frankie Edgar is a fighter who likes to move around the outside of the octagon anyway, and only in the last two rounds of the rematch moved Henderson to between himself and the cage. Equally, Nate Diaz shares his brother’s poor footwork and struggles to cut off the octagon unless his opponent is wilting from exhaustion.

Lack of Set Ups

The second major fault in Henderson’s striking is that he rarely sets up his kicks. While I pointed out his ability to kick straight from his stance is a unique skill and an enviable one, it should be used to bolster an orthodox striking game, rather than replace orthodox set ups and technique.

While Frankie Edgar was forced to eat the power of Henderson’s kicks when Henderson threw them in the first bout, he did catch a great many of Henderson’s kicks to the point where he looked almost telepathic. We all know that the jab is faster than the rear hand, because of the extra distance that the rear hand has to cover—but think how much further even the fastest rear leg kick has to travel.

In his rematch with Edgar, Henderson focused more intensely on the low kick which is much harder to throw without the set up step. If not set up with punches, the low kick can easily be seen coming and against Guida, Edgar and Diaz, Henderson has ended up turning his back to his opponents off of his missed kicks.

Henderson’s tendency to throw one strike at a time from the outside also plays against him sometimes. While pot-shotting is perfect for fighting Nick Diaz and Frankie Edgar—offensive strikers—Anthony Pettis had his success against Henderson on the counter.

On the few occasions which Henderson threw more than one strike in combination he had great success against Pettis and didn’t offer such large openings for counter strikes.

Conclusions

It seems as though the best method for at least out striking Henderson (the field in which I can offer the most insight) seems to be in countering his most common habits. As Henderson almost always engages with kicks, baiting the low kick and withdrawing the leg before dashing in with punches as he misses seems like a method which might work well to carry the fight to Henderson.

With regards to boxing—Henderson has a solid left hand but it is not nearly as dexterous as his right—and it often falls out of position in exchanges (such as when Frankie Edgar hurt him). Circling toward Henderson’s left side would afford the opportunity to counter strike either off of a slow Henderson left straight, or in muffling a left roundhouse kick with the forearms and coming back with a punching combination before Henderson could set his foot down.

If a fighter were able to pressure Henderson in this way without conceding the takedown—drawing kicks and coming back with counter combinations—he could hopefully either hurt Henderson or put him on the run. When Henderson feels himself near the fence is when he is tempted to fight his way out—this is certainly the point at which he seems most vulnerable.

Of course this is all hypothetical and many of these holes may not even exist anymore. Gilbert Melendez might not even try to exploit them.

Hopefully UFC on Fox 7 will offer us further insight—but it should at least provide us with an entertaining title scrap.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking, and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

TUF’s Uriah Hall: Is There Any Chance That He Is the Next Anderson Silva?

Those of you who have watched this season of The Ultimate Fighter will doubtless be aware of Uriah Hall being touted as perhaps the best striker the show has seen. You will probably also be aware that some of the more optimistic fans out there are alre…

I’m not here to say what a fighter can or can’t do. Two people step onto the mat at the beginning of each fight and everything about both men affects the outcome on that given day. What I can do is highlight some of the technical triumphs and failings which Uriah Hall carries and exhibits in his bouts.

The first thing to note about Uriah Hall is that he is not only extremely talented in his kicking game, but he is intelligent about it too. While the spinning back hook kick takes some skill to even throw – you could walk into a gym anywhere in the world and there would be a guy there who could do them… in thin air.

Hall’s brilliance was displayed against Adam Cella when he set up and then landed his spinning back roundhouse kick flush without a previous attempt.

The first sign of intelligence in Hall’s striking can be seen in the fact that he waited until the last seconds of the opening round to throw the kick. In the footage of the fight the hammer can be heard signaling 10 seconds remaining in the round, and then Hall throws his kick. This is simply good preparation – if a fighter is going to attempt something with a good chance of ending up in a bad position when it goes wrong, the last 10 seconds of a round are the best time to take the risk.

It is the same with intelligent submission fighters – if they get the mount they will hold the position and work for conservative submissions before they attempt an armbar which will land them in bottom position if they don’t finish it. 10 seconds is easily enough time to land a wheel kick or finish an armbar, but it is easy to survive 10 seconds underneath an opponent should it go wrong.

So how did Hall actually set up his spinning kick? Well the wheel kick enters on the right side of an opponent’s guard – like a left hook. It is necessary then to remove the opponent’s right forearm from a position where it can block. Hall did this by spamming the jab. Hall’s jab isn’t especially sharp but Adam Cella was stifled by it.

As Cella‘s right hand came to rest in a position in front of him where it was ready to catch or parry the jab, he sacrificed defense on the right side of his jaw. Before throwing the kick Hall performed a jab to the body to make the inexperienced Cella move his right hand even further away from his jaw. Junior dos Santos often uses the jab to the body to get MMA fighters, who simply don’t know better, to drop their hands to deal with it.

WIth Cella‘s right hand moving to parry at the slightest hint of a jab from Hall, Hall was able to fake and spin, connecting clean with his wheel kick on the jaw.

While Hall’s all around striking game is nowhere near on the level of Badr Hari or Stefan Leko, the bout between those two world class kickboxers ended with an almost identical set up.

Notice how Hari retreats while jabbing (somewhat uncharacteristically for Hari) before spinning and connecting behind Leko‘s right hand.

Unfortunately comparisons to Anderson Silva are completely unfounded on a technical level. While Hall has an excellent kicking game and a good jab, his boxing – as a science- has substantial holes.

Anderson Silva is masterful at moving around the cage, as is Lyoto Machida. Uriah Hall is always fighting with his back to the cage and nowhere to move should he need to retreat. He places himself in a situation where he must always move to either one side or the other.

This is fine in one sense – he still has two directions in which he can move – but when he does move in those directions it is often with his head held high and unguarded. Against Adam Cella, Hall continued to circle into Hall’s right hand with his chin up.

Against his most recent opponent, Dylan Andrews, Hall walked onto a couple of good punches from a completely passive and over matched opponent simply because he circles out with his hands out of position and his shoulders low.

On the single occasion in the bout when Andrews attacked with more than one punch in combination, he was able to back Hall onto the fence and dump him to the floor.

A final fault in Hall’s stand up is his tendency to reach for punches. While he seems to have trained out his fondness for leaning straight backwards, Hall will still reach to parry punches when he is moving away. This exposes him to follow up strikes on the same side.

Faking the jab and coming with a lead hook, faking the right straight and coming with a right hook, or throwing a jab or straight and following with a high kick on the same side. These are all the sorts of things that an opponent can do to catch Hall with a telling blow through his limited defenses.

Now Hall is still young and with a 6 foot frame and an 80 inch reach at middleweight he could very easily become a top contender in the division. Further to that the middleweight division just flat out lacks striking talent outside of a few guys.

The single important thing to take away from this article is that flash and shock value are not elite striking – it is how a fighter positions himself in the ring or cage, how rarely he is forced to expose himself, and how disciplined he can remain late in a fight which define a masterful striker.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking, and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

UFC on Fuel 9: The Jack Slack Tactical Breakdown

UFC on Fuel 9 was an entertaining enough card, bringing a few good finishes and some excitement as any good event should. While it will not be remembered as anything great, it certainly played out much better than it could have, having lost its main Sw…

Matt Mitrione picked up an easy knockout victory against the always-over-aggressive Phil De Fries, Brad Pickett picked up a decision victory over Mike Easton, and Diego Brandao submitted the gangly Pablo Garza earlier in the night.

My job is to analyse the more technically expert skills displayed at UFC on Fuel 9, so I will be focusing on Conor McGregor‘s UFC debut, Ross Pearson’s halting of Ryan Couture’s ascendancy and on Gegard Mousasi‘s systematic flattening of Ilir Latifi‘s nose.

Ross Pearson vs. Ryan Couture

Couture looked every bit his father’s son when he came out and immediately pressed Pearson against the fence. Couture is—unfortunately for him—nothing like his father in terms of fighting ability along the fence.

Where Randy Couture could make an opponent carry his weight, force them to stumble and have them eating four or five jolting uppercuts and a knee to the midsection as they stumbled to stay upright, Ryan Couture spent the entire first round with Pearson attempting to flatten Pearson to the fence without using any effective offense.

Pearson, to his credit, did an excellent job of shifting his hips, creating space and stifling Couture’s offense by working to get his head into Couture’s face or under his jaw.

Pearson, with his back to the fence, was happy to simply stifle Couture’s efforts in this way. Often, it led to Couture getting impatient and giving Pearson the space to escape.

Pearson’s destruction of Couture in the second round was attributed by many in the media to Pearson “finding his timing,” but in truth, it was more to do with the fact that Couture chose to engage Pearson with single punches and kicks.

A master of the inside slip, Pearson will take his head off line to the left, avoiding strikes and combine the movement with a hard right hook or come back from his crouched position with a beautiful left hook. To stop Pearson doing this, it is necessary to threaten him with high kicks, knees and uppercuts every time he looks to move his head. Couture, on the other hand, opted to run in with punches.

Couture took a step back from that strategy and started throwing low kicks, which did little to stop Pearson moving forward. As Pearson caught one such low kick, he was able to throw Couture to the mat and follow with some ground-and-pound.

As Couture regained his footing, Pearson swarmed on him against the fence. From here, Pearson took an angle to the right to land his left hook more effectively. Notice how Pearson’s left hook was no longer an attack that entered on Couture’s left side but came straight through the middle of his guard from 12 o’clock.

Here is Mike Tyson demonstrating his methods for getting to the side of opponents in order to throw his hooks from dominant angles.

To read more about Pearson’s inside slip and boxing game, check out my previous piece:

Best of the Best: Ross Pearson and the Inside Slip.

Conor McGregor vs. Marcus Brimage

For many the breakout fighter of the night was Conor McGregor. Far from the stereotypical scrappy Irish brawler, McGregor seemed every bit the striking technician in his bout.

The wonderful thing about striking as a concept rather than a discipline is that while there is a great list of things not to do—there is no one comprehensive list of things that a fighter should do. One can watch a card like UFC on Fuel 9 and see several wonderfully different but equally effective striking styles.

Where Pearson’s head is always over his forward foot, in anticipation of slipping and coming back with a counter punch, McGregor‘s weight is centered, and he looks to use his footwork more than movement.

Both styles have their own strengths and weaknesses, but the strength of McGregor‘s is the same as that of Gustafsson and Lyoto Machida—it makes back peddling exceptionally easy when a fighter’s weight is not over his lead foot.

While McGregor‘s punches lack the visible movement of a front-foot, heavy fighter like Pearson, they can also carry a good snap because the upright stance keeps the shoulders directly over the hips, making it easier to turn them together.

When crouched over the lead foot, a fighter can become too focused on turning his shoulders around, forgetting his hips because they are not always directly under him.

McGregor‘s A-game seems to be to draw his opponent’s out and counter punch them. This he demonstrated with a beautiful step back to left straight in the opening seconds.

McGregor, as he moves back, routinely swings his lead hand out but keeps his rear hand cocked. This allows him to slap in with a counter right hook or turn his hips into a counter left straight as he sees fit. Whichever hand he uses, McGregor likes his opponents to charge him.

A final neat trick which McGregor showed was a bolo punch. Made famous by Kid Gavilan, this punch is whipped in with the arm after a slight back swing. The arc of the arm makes it a confusing punch to deal with, and the back swing makes it difficult to time.

Many fighters, like Roy Jones Jr. or Ray Leonard, would use a faked bolo punch to keep their opponent confused and to show boat. Here is the great Gavilan talking about the bolo punch.

Gegard Mousasi vs. Ilir Latifi

There isn’t that much to say about this bout, except that Mousasi dealt well with a last-minute change of opponent, especially given how different the two Swedes are. Instead of having to walk down the elusive, rangy and constantly moving Gustafsson, Mousasi was instead charged with fighting a much shorter, stockier wrestler.

Much has been made of Mousasi‘s flicking jab, but in truth, his success was more to do with Latifi‘s lack of competence on the feet.

Mousasi would come in with his lead hand low and simply flick it up through the middle of Latifi‘s guard. The difference between the two fighters was Mousasi‘s active right hand.

Mousasi‘s right hand would move to check Latifi‘s as he came in, while Latifi‘s remained nailed to the side of his jaw in anticipation of a left hook which never came.

Mousasi‘s active right hand made it possible for him to move in without fear of a jab from Latifi, leaving the slower, shorter left hook and right hand as Latifi‘s only hope of connecting on Mousasi. Covering Latifi‘s lead hand, Mousasi would snap in a jab and immediately perform a defensive movement such as a step back or a parry.

As the bout progressed, because of Mousasi‘s active right hand, he got caught with a couple of left hooks from Latifi.

Fighters with an active rear hand can often be caught off guard by the left hook—it was the story of Joe Louis’ career. By the end of the second round, however, Mousasi had almost abandoned his backward movement and instead was ducking under punches after his jabs.

Another nice technique which Mousasi used effectively was what I term the “skipping stone” punch. When Latifi switched to a southpaw stance, Mousasi would use his lead hand to tear down Latifi‘s lead hand and immediately jab through the hole presented with the same hand.

While he didn’t pick up the finish and his opponent was clearly overmatched, this was exactly the type of performance which Mousasi should have put on.

In a debut against an unknown, last-minute replacement, too many fighters would have gone all-out because of the expectation that they should finish the opponent easily.

Mousasi showed the patience and efficiency which he is known for and never gave Latifi a chance.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on MMA” target=”_blank”>Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Best of the Best: Ross Pearson and the Inside Slip

This is the second article in my Best of the Best series, examining fighters who best demonstrate one facet of the fight game in MMA. The previous piece was Anderson Silva’s Thai Clinch.One of the topics I am most often asked about is head movement. Wh…

This is the second article in my Best of the Best series, examining fighters who best demonstrate one facet of the fight game in MMA. The previous piece was Anderson Silva‘s Thai Clinch.

One of the topics I am most often asked about is head movement. What is the place of head movement in MMA and who is particularly effective in using it? Obviously we can point to examples of good head movement such as Anderson Silva, Fedor Emelianenko and B.J. Penn, and we can point to fighters who lack head movement, such as Nick Diaz and Diego Sanchez.

We can even point to fighters who use head movement all the time except when they attack, at which point they stand bolt upright—an ailment I have affectionately named Rashad Evans syndrome. But the question of when head movement is appropriate is an equally important one.

B. J. Penn’s overly enthusiastic focus on head movement numbed him to correct use of range, and his footwork suffered because of it—making him a sitting target for low kicks and body shots. This is an example of how excellence in one area of the striking game does not mean that a fighter has “excellent striking” as a whole.

Aside from numbing a fighter to proper footwork, over-zealous head movement in MMA also places the user in great danger of eating a hard kick or knee. One only needs to watch Chuck Liddell’s head kick on a ducking Babalu or Jose Aldo’s counter knee as his opponent ducked in with a body jab to understand that ducking the head is not always appropriate or safe.

A few more examples are Mark Hunt slipping straight into Cro Cop’s left high kick during their match in K-1 and Marlon Sandro attempting to slip a salvo of half effort punches from Pat Curran, only to lean into a fight-ending high kick.

Someone who does use head movement incredibly effectively in MMA is Ross Pearson, who meets Ryan Couture this weekend in Sweden. Today I want to focus on just one movement that Pearson performs well, in a sport where it is exceptionally dangerous to attempt: the inside slip.

To understand just how dangerous a great inside slipper can be, take a look at Jersey Joe Walcott’s knockout of Ezzard Charles to win the heavyweight title. This is possibly the greatest one-punch KO of all time, and it is to my mind certainly the best finish in heavyweight title history.

Whenever you speak to a new coach, terms change and pairs are often reversed. An inside slip to some might be a slip to the inside of one’s own stance (right for an orthodox fighter), but I use the term to describe slipping to the inside of an opponent’s jab (to the left for an orthodox fighter vs an orthodox fighter).

Slipping inside of an opponent’s jab, rather than towards the outside of it, is a good deal more dangerous because it carries a fighter’s head towards the opponent’s cocked right hand. If you want to see just how badly this can go wrong – watch Quinton Jackson lean straight into Wanderlei Silva’s right hook at the end of their second bout.

Yes, to slip inside of an opponent’s jab takes some guts to attempt and a good understanding of what the opponent is most likely to do. Anticipation, speed and common sense are the keys to success with this position.

If it is so dangerous and so taxing, why bother? Because of the wonderful counter punches which suddenly open up from this position. Some of the most memorable knockouts in boxing history have come from “inside position”. It is a wonderful method to close the distance for a fighter who excels with the lead hook (such as Pearson).

There are numerous ways to alleviate some of the dangers of the inside slip. One can bring the right elbow across the face to act as a hand destruction should the opponent punch the elbow, or one can extend the right hand, palm open, to pin the opponent’s right forearm to his chest—preventing him from striking during the slip (a favourite of Archie Moore).

Most fighters who use the inside slip have success almost entirely because of good timing and anticipation, however. Ross Pearson is no different. Pearson excels against opponents who will attempt to engage him with jabs, where he can use his inside slip to maximum effect.

George Sotiropoulos was a fantastic stylistic matchup for Pearson in this respect. Sotiropoulos‘ jab is sharp and hard, but he lacks combination punching skill and as such attempted to pot shot Pearson. Throughout the fight, whenever G-Sot thrust in a rapier-like jab, Pearson would slip to the inside of it and change level.

In the early going, this led to the two men colliding with Pearson’s head in G-Sot’s sternum.

As the match progressed, Pearson would land effective offense both with his right hand during the slip and using the slip to coil himself for the left hook.

In addition to a nice right hook to the body, Pearson will also use a right hook to the temple combined with an inside slip. If he successfully slips his opponent’s jab the right hook travels over the top in a Cross Counter, probably the most effective knockout punch in the boxing arsenal and a favourite of Alistair Overeem and Mark Hunt among others.

Pearson is at his best, however, when he has his range and timing down and is using the inside slip to coil his brilliant left hook. Notice how deeply he slips, making it extremely hard for his opponent to follow him with a right hand. This is a far deeper slip than when he is using his right hand to counter simultaneously.

Mike Tyson is remembered for almost always slipping to his opponent’s power hand side first, but was tough to hit because of how deep his slip was.

Ross Pearson relies very heavily on this inside slip and his level changes, however. When Ross is forced to stay upright he has been hit hard and finished before. Cub Swanson used the threat of wild, winging head kicks to keep Pearson standing upright, where his lack of effective footwork makes him easy to hit.

Edson Barboza was also able to nail Pearson with punches off of a blocked kick. Even G-Sot was able to wobble Pearson with a stiff jab after forcing him to reconsider his regular strategy with a wild front kick at Pearson’s head.

Why does this work so well? If Pearson slips into a shin bone, foot or knee, his forearms are not going to be able to absorb the force of the kick and he will probably eat much of the force with his head as it moves to meet the attack. Forcing Pearson to engage in a kickboxing match limits his options and makes him an easy target. Boxing with Pearson is generally going to get a fighter hurt with tight counter punches.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking, and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com

Best of the Best: Anderson Silva’s Muay Thai Clinch Work

The Thai Clinch or plumm is a term which, in mixed martial arts circles, is used to describe a single position—the double-collar tie. This is the terrifying position with both hands cupped on the base of the opponent’s skull from which brut…

The Thai Clinch or plumm is a term which, in mixed martial arts circles, is used to describe a single position—the double-collar tie. This is the terrifying position with both hands cupped on the base of the opponent’s skull from which brutal knees to the face or body may be delivered. This position in itself requires more subtlety than most realise, but on its own, it is not “The Thai Clinch” or the plumm.

In truth, the plumm is just a blanket term for the clinch in Muay Thai and the Muay Thai philosophy in the clinch is a beautiful one. In MMA it is hard to think of anyone who epitomizes this philosophy better than the Spider at the centre of the Middleweight web, Anderson Silva.

In Muay Thai, the clinch is used to throw opponents—as it is in wrestling—but the purpose is not always to score a takedown for its own sake. In Muay Thai, the opponent is either off-balanced and struck as he attempts to stay upright, thrown hard to the mat in hopes of hurting him as well as scoring points, or thrown to the mat and hit on the way down. This is a style of clinch fighting geared toward violence more than toward tripping and opponent and achieving a pinning position.

Here are some clips of Saenchai Sor. Kingstar demonstrating some of Muay Thai’s clinch techniques.

Now the flashy climbing elbows are not that much use in a sport where people can just jump into your guard should you attempt them (though props are due to Demetrious Johnson for pulling it off against John Dodson), but Saenchai’s trips to unbalance opponents into strikes are an excellent example of the type of techniques that Silva uses so well.

Silva does not tend to take fights to the ground—except occasional performances against dangerous bangers with deficiencies on the ground like Lee Murray or Curtis Stout—Anderson prefers to strike. Yet Anderson has used trips to off-balance numerous opponents and make them expose themselves to his strikes.

Anderson’s second bout with Rich Franklin is a fantastic example. Rich Franklin knew that Anderson was going to try to secure the double collar tie, break Rich’s posture and work knee strikes. Franklin did an excellent job of maintaining his posture in this match, but Silva had far more tricks up his sleeve than a Wanderlei Silva or Mauricio Rua. Silva will not simply grab and pull on the head until he gets his way and give up if he can’t.

Anderson used a trip which he likely didn’t even want to complete to force Franklin to step back. Franklin’s posture broke as he stumbled to stay on balance and this brought his head toward Silva’s right hand which Silva threaded behind Franklin’s head to complete the double collar tie.

This is truly the difference between fighters who flail to grab a hold of their opponents head and try to knee, and someone like Silva who will set up his grips scientifically.

Anderson Silva’s fight with the overmatched Stephan Bonnar was a clinic in clinch fighting from a striker’s perspective as Silva dominated the fight with short strikes while his back was to the cage. Any time Bonnar rested his head on Silva’s shoulder, Silva would bob down with a bend of his legs, come up with a sharp shoulder strike to Bonnar‘s nose and use the space to move or get off a good knee strike to the midsection.

Another great example, similar to Saenchai‘s throws into knee strikes, came as Bonnar leaned on Silva, Silva turned and threw Bonnar againt the fence and landed a glancing right straight on the confused American Psycho.

Silva’s domination of the clinch against Bonnar was so complete that at one point, Silva used a two-on-one grip to deflect a knee strike with Bonnar‘s own arm.

The finish to the Bonnar fight came off a successful trip, which Bonnar rushed to get back up. As he did so, Silva followed him and shoved him into the fence, switching feet and hitting Bonnar with a hard knee to the midsection as Bonnar rebounded off the cage.

Beautiful gif of the sequence here.

In MMA, it is not just possible to catch the opponent with a hard strike while they are off balance on the way down, but also when they are regaining their balance on the way up.

Silva genius extends to the fact that once he has the truly dominant double-collar tie grip, he does not go wild and head hunt with knee strikes—he will instead use the control to steer the opponent into elbows, punches and will even throw crisp, low kicks while still holding his opponent’s head.

A final factor that can really be pointed to as a reason for all of Silva’s success in MMA is his ability to aim. Silva does not just throw strikes—he aims and picks his strikes. Where many fighters are completely stifled if their opponent has strong posture when they have the double-collar tie, Silva is not at all stifled and lands effective knees to the midsection.

The reason that Silva’s knee strikes are so effective and other fighters seem less so is that Silva does not just throw knees to the abdomen (which is well-conditioned in most fighters and naturally clenched as the head is pulled upon) but aims knees at the unprotected rib cage. If Silva does throw a knee straight up-the-middle to the body, it will connect right on the solar plexus rather than against the opponent’s abdominal muscles.

This care in aiming pays massive dividends and is why Silva can throw half-effort strikes with frightening effectiveness while other fighters strain and expend themselves with ineffective blows.

The clinch from a striker’s perspective is massively underused in MMA to this day, but Silva has shown how effective the clinch can be as a platform for striking in direct conflict with a wrestler’s approach to the clinch. Hopefully in years to come we will see much more effective striking from the clinch in MMA.

Jack Slack breaks down over 70 striking tactics employed by 20 elite strikers in his first ebook, Advanced Striking, and discusses the fundamentals of strategy in his new ebook, Elementary Striking.

Jack can be found on Twitter, Facebook and at his blog: Fights Gone By.

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com