Phil and David break down everything you need to know about Rothwell vs. Dos Santos for UFN 86 in Croatia, and everything you don’t about the sobering reality of prizefight senescence and perfect weapon resurgence.
Ben Rothwell faces off against Junior Dos Santos for maybe heavyweight contendership this April 10, 2016 at the Arena Zagreb in Zagreb, Croatia.
Single sentence summary:
Phil: Dark Lord Rothwell attempts to perform his most dastardly deed yet, in killing off the remnant’s of Junior Dos Santos’s title hopes.
David: The world’s most dramatically declining dangerous heavyweight faces off against its most otherworldy overachiever.
Stats?
“Big” Ben Rothwell 36-9
Odds: -450
Junior “Cigano” Dos Santos 17-4
Odds: +400
History lesson / introduction to the fighters
Phil: Back in 2011, Rothwell-Hunt did not look like a fight between future contenders. It also showed just what a terrible idea it was to have heavyweights fighting at altitude, years before Werdum-Velasquez. When did Rothwell turn the corner? Some might say it was the Schaub fight, but it’s really the Brandon Vera showdown, when he juked and jived his way into a fight-ending combination. It looked silly but I bet it didn’t feel silly to Vera. That’s the new Rothwell: someone not just at ease with his own weirdness, but someone visibly feeding off it, and luxuriating in their new confidence.
David: Rothwell is now polishing himself with that nucar smell. He’s got a swagger to his game that never existed before. What was once Buddy Pine. Now, Syndrome. I’d add “but in a good way” except Rothwell may be a vigilante with questionable ethics who dons a cape due to paranoid delusions in his spare time. He’s a strange dude, but he’s a great example of what we love in our professional athletes when it comes to personality: an optimal level of eccentricity.
Phil: Around the time that Rothwell was almost getting armbarred by Mark Hunt, Junior Dos Santos was on his way to being the best heavyweight on earth. He had a run to the belt which still stands up as one of the hardest ever taken in the sport, in any division, and he knocked out Cain Velasquez in just over a minute, in front of one of the biggest TV audiences the UFC has ever had, on the first ever Fox show. What the hell happened? Heavyweight careers are often attenuated, but Junior’s prime conversely seems far, far behind him.
David: Cain Velasquez. Cain did to Junior’s brains what Joe Grasso did to Cain’s knees. It doesn’t happen often, but for a single fight to change a athlete’s makeup, and even demeanor? It’s not unheard of. Dos Santos’ isn’t exactly Meldrick Taylor or anything, but it’s alarming nonetheless. This is kind of a good fight for him, all things told. At least I think.
What are the stakes?
Phil: This is as clear an example of trending up versus trending down as you’re likely to see in the sport. Since around 2012 Rothwell has been steadily increasing his momentum, and JDS has been dropping down into a tailspin.
David: Stakes? Another gogo choke away from a title shot. Rothwell is clearly heading in that direction. A Rothwell vs Werdum bout is as good as it gets for the heavyweight division. Yes, we’re a long way from Fedor vs. Crocop, but we take what we can get. A JDS win wouldn’t be bad either. It might force us to ask questions about JDS’s decline despite evidence on the contrary, but since this is heavyweight, he’d be a warm body with an impeccable history.
Where do they want it?
Phil: Regarding things like the establishment of distance, there’s been some recent debate about whether JDS is perhaps the inferior fighter in terms of fight IQ; at making the opponent fight “his” fight. I’m not sure. I don’t think either of these guys are particularly gifted at enforcing their games, in fact I’d say they’re both fairly bad at it. Instead the fundamental difference we’ve seen between JDS and Rothwell is that one of them has a broader (and, let’s face it, weirder) offensive toolset which is functional in more areas.
How does that skillset actually work for Big Ben? Essentially Blind Man’s Buff Muai Thai, where Rothwell feels his way forward and holds his arms out like a zombie, with his head far back. He parries punches and feels where the opponent is to land counters to punches, or to push their limbs to one side and allow for his favoured shots (an overhand to the temple or short upper). The style builds off his durability, ability to put power into short shots, and size. Weaknesses are generally around reach parity, because it’s not a rangy style, and that incoming shots are harder to see (particularly kicks and overhands).
David: Rothwell waves his limbs around like he’s trying out for a Jeff Speakman role. He reminds me of Poongko taking over Seth’s reigns in SFIV, overwhelming with focus attacks and offense both real and illusory. His aggressiveness hides his technical acumen, and vice versa. Ultimately I think what he excels at is distance management. But not in the obvious way of using leg kicks, a jab, or overhand rights. But in a real subversive way, using these strikes to manage the distance that isn’t there. Am I saying that he cuts off angles, and anticipates with bayou voodoo? Well yea.
But I’m also talking about his fight philosophy. Most fighters use a top down approach to fighting. As in, they work specifically with what they have. Brock Lesnar was a top down fighter, using brutish strength and top control to win bouts. Mirko Filipovic was a top down fighter, using that left high kick in particular to threaten that way everything else could fall into place. Rothwell is a bottom up fighter. As in, he works specifically with what’s missing. The fighters I didn’t expect him to exploit with grappling he did (Mitrione, Barnett), and the fighters I didn’t expect him to exploit with striking, he did (Overeem). This isn’t a bloated, long winded way of calling him a jack of all trades fighter; rather, a specific approach Rothwell takes to fighting that explains his efficient goofiness. He’s using a few elite skills (aided by size) to hack the backdoor victory mainframe instead of crashing through the front circuit gates.
Phil: JDS is a mid-range boxer. This is a fact which has become more pronounced over time, to an extent which is pretty damn depressing in all honesty. But let’s start with the positives! JDS is a fantastic offensive puncher. His jab is genuinely lovely, still one of the best in the sport, and he throws it to the head and body at a pace few can match, setting up a left hook and an ugly yet powerful overhand.
The problem is that his game seems to be built around the misconception that the mid-range sweet spot is somewhere the fight will somehow naturally come around to, and all he has to do is be appropriately defensive in other areas. Unfortunately, as more fighters have realized that they’re not obligated to play his game, JDS’s flaws have been exposed more and more. His defensive grappling is great, but he’s almost devoid of his own clinch or takedown offense, so opponents can cycle clinch entries on him against the cage with little to no risk. His defensive and offensive footwork are both mediocre, and if opponents drift out of the way of his initial jab he has no real way to chase them down apart from (sigh) a wheel kick or that overhand.
David: That’s the real issue right there. He’s just too binary. Luckily for him, this is heavyweight. So he can win UFC gold with that limited mindset. But the mindset becomes a threat after a certain point. JDS doesn’t just get neutralized when he has to defend though. He’s flat out vulnerable. His fight vision suffers from a serious case of peripheral blindess.
But at the heart of these flaws is still one of the more dangerous fighters on the planet. He throws one of the cleanest right hands in the division: a shot that happens to be fast, accurate, and well timed. In addition, the glass half full approach can point to Andrei Arlovski for fighters that have us questioning their future one minute, and serenading them with balloons and cupcakes the next. I really think the right coaching can help him because he’s working with such a strong foundation. Similar to Arlovski, who is still just an overhand right on legs.
Insight from past fights?
Phil: The Barnett fight was a strange one for Rothwell. Sure he won, but I didn’t think he looked all that great doing it. Most notable was the way that he ate an awful lot of jabs from Barnett, who doesn’t have a jab half as good as Junior’s.
In a strange way, a lot of Rothwell’s wins have come from scaring opponents into going off the rails- Overeem trying for a lunging right hand, Mitrione or Barnett going for sloppy takedowns. In all these cases, the opponent was winning but went outside the box and then got caught by the surprising depth of his game. What I’m saying here, is that if there is one thing JDS absolutely does not do… ever… it is go off the rails. If he’s fighting Rothwell in a mid-range standup fight (as I suspect we’ll see), he’ll keep it there forever.
David: Even Schaub had some success before he was straight ghosted. Still, dos Santos is getting even slower at exiting the mid range pocket, which is where Rothwell has the potential to feast on him in small doses.
X-Factors?
Phil: Levels of confidence, levels of damage, and all the way those two things play off one another, most specifically for Dos Santos.
David: Dos Santos finding whatever magic artifact that kept Arlovski not just relevant, but competitive.
Prognostication:
Phil: In many ways I think JDS is actually a nightmare for Rothwell. He has a long, stable jab to pierce the armour of Rothwell’s parries, his overhand is actually a reasonable option considering the potentially disastrous way Rothwell tries to lean back from punches, and likewise JDS won’t be overextending to hit Ben’s head, as he’s more than happy to jab to the body. Rothwell is neither a dedicated pressure or outfighter. But. In an odd mirror of the JDS-Overeem match, I just don’t believe in Dos Santos’ durability and given how he’s been dropped so frequently of late, it’s so easy to see him getting put away. Still, he’s got better pace, is a better (or at least more consistent) technician in the key midrange areas. I feel dreadful about making this pick. JDS by unanimous decision.
David: Since you’re so hopeful, I guess I gotta do the “fair and balanced” thing and pick Rothwell. I agree with everything you said. This is in a lot of very subtle and not so subtle ways, one of the more winnable fights for JDS at the elite levels. I’m not even sure what to think of Rothwell’s newfound durability (before he had been finished in different ways by far lesser fighter), which I’m a little skeptical of. But I do know that he’s in the right frame of mind. How can I question this laugh? Ben Rothwell by TKO, round 3.