Hall Hopes Spinning S–t Finally Earns His Striking Some Respect

Hall wants his due after landing a bunch of spinning kicks on Darren Elkins and dropping him multiple times.

Jiu jitsu ace Ryan Hall fought on the prelim portion of Saturday night’s UFC Sacramento card, and he basically scrapped like your little brother spamming the same two special attacks in Street Fighter 2. His weapons of choice against Darren Elkins? Spinning kicks and Imanari rolls.

The result was a unique looking fight that clearly confused the hell out of the crowd. As boos came down from the rafters, Hall was given the decision win and improved his UFC win streak to four. And while the crowd didn’t properly appreciate what they witnessed, Hall is hopeful people will start taking his striking seriously after he dropped the crazy durable Elkins multiple times over their bout.

“You try to be as tricky as possible to deal with,” Hall said regarding his evolution from ground specialist into whatever the hell you’d call him now (via MMA Junkie). “My striking has really come along. I’ve cleanly outstruck every opponent I’ve fought. I don’t know why the narrative is different. Nobody wants to grapple with me, but we’ll see what happens when that changes.”

“I feel very fortunate to have learned from some of the very best martial artists in the world in their disciplines, and I think that’s something I believed in for a long time,” he said. “I was one of the better jiu jitsu guys in the world when I started mixed martial arts. I had nothing else but I feel like I had at least an appreciation for being decent at one thing and trying to track down world caliber wrestlers, the best strikers. And also sometimes the little off beat esoteric ones that maybe people don’t always necessarily appreciate — maybe it works in its context or doesn’t work over here but maybe helps surrounding skills. You can do some interesting things.”

”I feel fortunate to learn from a lot of the best coaches. Firas Zahabi, Kenny Florian, guys with unbelievably deep levels of mixed martial arts experience and then combine it with Stephen Thompson, Ray Thompson, Raymond Daniels, karate style, taekwondo style. Of course I have a great deal to learn but I just try to be different and try to fight in a way that I feel is authentic.”

It’s certainly unique. We can only hope UFC brass appreciate what they have in Hall. Dude deserves to be on the main card from now on so everybody can see what a mixed martial maniac he is.