Fight Study 55: Jones vs. Reyes (transcript) (Patreon)

On February 8th, the UFC made its way back to the Lone Star state and they slotted Jon Jones vs Dominick Reyes for the light heavyweight title as the head liner. After 5 hard rounds, Jones emerged victorious with a unanimous decision win, but it wasn’t without controversy. The three judges who scored this fight were Marcos Rosales, Chris Lee, and Joe Solis. Rosales gave rounds 2, 4, and 5 to Jones for a 48-47 score, while Lee gave rounds 3 through 5 to Jones for his 48-47 score. Solis got the most heat for his score, which he gave rounds 2 through 5 for Jones for his 49 to 46 score. All three judges were watching the same fight, but came back with different results. There’s plenty to talk about in regards to judging, but before we get into all that, we should talk about the fight itself in greater detail. Even with the controversial score cards, the title fight itself was pretty amazing and showcased all the things we as MMA fans love about the sport.

It’s no secret that at Southpaw, we’ve been fans of Reyes since we started the podcast. The division isn’t the deepest and it’s lack of true athletic 205 pounders meant that Reyes is a bright spot and a true contender. Despite our fondness, the fact remains that Reyes is only 6 years and 12 fights into his career heading into the Jon Jones title fight. His UFC tenure is half of his entire MMA career. He has no collegiate wrestling or high level striking background to fall back on, he is simply a very athletic and tall light heavyweight that could be molded into something special. The fight with Jones was the first time he saw the 4th round in his career. Even with all that going against him, Reyes had the fight of his life and showed that his future is bright, despite the L on his record. In the fight preview, I wrote about how Reyes can combine all the strategies that previous opponents have utilized against Jones with success. I don’t know if Reyes or his team read that article, but I’m glad that it was mostly spot on and much of it was executed.

Gustafsson had success in their first fight by constantly staying mobile and having Jones come towards him. Jones does his best work striking when he’s countering his opponent’s aggression, but when he has to chase he doesn’t look nearly as invincible. Reyes did much of the same but also managed to mix in a lot of kicks as well as punches. Gustafsson also had some moments in the first and second fight where he was successfully cutting off the cage against Jones, but the threat of the takedown kept him from following up with boxing combinations. Reyes didn’t have this fear and used his strikes well and lit up Jones on occasion. When the low kicks did come in the early rounds, Reyes was either withdrawing his lead legs or checking them to keep Jones from doing too much damage. When Jones was done with his kicks, Reyes blitzed in with punches (similar to how Machida did) and tried his best to make Jones pay every time he was stationary, post-strike. In the boxing range, Reyes copied a lot of Cormier’s original game plan and made sure to occupy Jones’ hands and strike over the top. Unlike Cormier, Reyes’s height allowed him to connect far more frequently and since he wasn’t striking upwards, he was able to land with more consistency.

Leading up to the fight, Reyes spoke confidently about how his boxing was superior to Jones, and he backed those words up early on. His right hook, southpaw left straight, and uppercuts were used effectively to hurt Jones up close and kept him from ducking in carelessly. Reyes wasn’t shy about throwing left straights to the body, in fact a well timed punch to the midsection dropped Jones in round 1 and had him scrambling back up. During clinches, it was Reyes who was able to utilize sharp punches and effective head movement to keep Jones from throwing elbows and teeing off with knees.

Even though Reyes is a 205 pounder, he moved like a light weight and utilized great footwork combined with accurate punches. He had two particular setups that were done quite well, the darting left and triangle step. For the darting left, Reyes would dart in with the left straight (hence the name), then step off to an angle, facing Jones at 90 degrees before throwing another strike. This occurred a few times and it had Jones circling and literally running away, since he knew he was in the worst possible position to return fire. It’s a great move since it disguises your rhythm and throws off your opponents timing, not to mention that you’re not in position to receive counters from your opponent. The closest comparison off the top of my head is Giorgio Petrosyan, another southpaw striker and arguably one of the best kickboxers in history.

As for the triangle step, the move isn’t complicated, but executing it against high level opponents is pretty difficult. You step off to one side of your opponent, then immediately hop off to the other with a punch, and then angle out by jumping to the other side and behind your opponent. For instance, Reyes would step to his right, skip immediately to other foot and nail Jones with a left straight, then duck under and hop to his right foot and go behind Jones. A panicked Jones would bolt out and try to reset, and he came close to eating some nasty follow up strikes had he not moved out of the way. This was used to great effect by TJ Dillashaw against Renan Barao in both match-ups, and was a favorite of Roy Jones Jr during his middleweight days. Although both movements sound similar, the darting left was used by Reyes whenever he was being pressured by Jones against the fence, and the triangle step was done mostly when Reyes was out in the open.

Moving onto to kicks, one of the things that Thiago Santos did well in his fight against Jones was utilizing kicks to keep Jones at range and limit his mobility. In the early rounds, Reyes did a fantastic job of this and threw kicks frequently to keep Jones honest and constantly guessing at the targets. Calf kicks, inside leg kicks, body kicks, and high kicks were all on the menu and Jones got to sample each and every one of them. We’ve said this before, but it’s always worth repeating: if you want to keep someone from kicking you, you should kick them as well. It doesn’t have to be pretty, but it does have to be constant. Even awkward low kicks thrown in a less than perfect fashion can slow down a fighter, and both Quinton Jackson and Daniel Cormier had success with this against Jones. Even guys who throw “ugly” kicks like Justin Gaethje and Tony Ferguson can slow down more effective kickboxers like Cerrone and Pettis, respectively.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how well Reyes handled the clinch game and takedowns from Jones. In the preview I wrote, and I quote, “Since it’s almost inevitable that Reyes will get clinched at some point (even an older Weidman was able to do so), it makes sense to develop some weapons against Jones in this range. In order to give himself the best chance, Reyes will want to make sure that his hands aren’t tied up by Jones, so making sure that he breaks those grips quickly is going to be key. Second, Reyes can’t let Jones dig his forehead under his jaw, since this is a position where Jones can start hammering away at the body with knees and hooks off the break before engaging and repeating the dance all over again.” Reyes was keenly aware of this danger and made sure that the moment he felt Jones dig his forehead under his jaw, he would reposition his head, use his arms to frame off Jones, and step off at an angle to break away safely. During the times when Jones would scoop up Reyes with a double leg and successfully take Reyes down, he would immediately scoot back into the cage and start wall walking back up while gripping Jones’s hands to make sure that a secondary attempt would be extremely difficult. Reyes utilized the same defense that Robert Whittaker relies on and was successfully used against Yoel Romero during his two title fights. Team Alpha Male fighters are famous for their ability to scramble up after any takedown they get scored on them, and even though it takes a lot of energy, it prevents wrestlers from being to ground their opponents and score with strikes from a superior position on the ground.

With all that said, Jones wasn’t exactly a stationary target that took all this sitting down. He’s been in these five round title fights before and he knew exactly what he had to do in order to win on the scorecards. In the Jones portion of the fight preview, I compared him to Mayweather in how he’s a master of knowing exactly how to game the system. Jones knows (from experience) just how much energy he should exert in each round to stay competitive for 25 minutes. He knows every inch of the Octagon and how he can look dominant in the eyes of the judges even if he’s not throwing a strike. He sees what you’re doing and how he can counter with just the right amount of force to keep you on edge and just slightly ahead on the scorecards. This isn’t something that comes overnight, it takes years to refine and have down to a science.

Jones can take his time knowing that his veteran savvy and chin will largely hold up and give him the moments necessary to study you and come up with effective counters. In the early goings, he knew that Reyes had a great first round, and from the second round on, he was calculating the amount of energy that Reyes was expanding. Knowing that the pace would be too much, Jones started pressuring Reyes so that he would be forced to constantly be on the move and not given the moments of rest that he needs to recover. His kicks would also hamper the lateral movements of Reyes, which slowed down as the fight wore on. One of the things that no one has really ever effectively countered against Jones is his varied shot selection. Other pundits have pointed this out, but Jones is a master of following up one strike with another that’s completely different. Instead of punching with a set combo that he drills with pad work, he’ll throw a right hook followed by a left front kick. He might follow that up with a long break, stalking his opponent before throwing a jab followed by maybe a low line side kick. This is hard to counter and defend since it comes down to predicting which strike is going to be the follow up. Think of it like the comic book character, Deadpool. He’s largely effective at hand-to-hand combat because his enemies don’t know what he’s going to do next, his movement patterns are wildly unpredictable and hard to gauge.

Jones was able to land effective counters when Reyes would throw strikes without a proper set up, and once he started stalking Reyes, the gas tank started to empty a little bit faster. The length of Jones is always going to give opponents problems, and it was definitely something that caught Reyes off guard. Just as he thought he would move away just in time to avoid the jab, he would eat a straight punch or take a kick to the body. Even though Reyes targeted the midsection often, it didn’t seem like Jones slowed down much, or at least he was able to hide the damage quite well.

When it was all said and done, Jones squeaked out a close decision win. There are strong arguments to be made for both Reyes and Jones, but the biggest problem in all this is the judging criteria itself. The big question that MMA judging can’t seem to answer is…why have rules if you can’t even follow them? Let me explain what I mean. In every major sport, there are clear sets of instructions that the referees and judges can utilize to ensure that the match is scored effectively and fairly. In football, a touchdown is worth 6 points, and a field goal is worth 3. In basketball, a free throw is worth one point, a shot outside the three point line is worth three, and all other baskets are worth 2. When there is a dispute on an infraction in any of the sports, the action is paused and great scrutiny is placed on whether the team or a player should be punished or it counts as fair play. MMA in particular suffers from an unclear scoring criteria that damages the sport and the fighters involved. The UFC points to boxing as having problems with the judges, but too often those same judges are used to score MMA bouts. See the problem? The unified rules of MMA are also different from state to state. How are fighters (and judges) supposed to keep up and know which ones will be used, especially if the fight takes place overseas? This is a big issue when you consider that unlike basketball, baseball, football, or hockey, fighters can’t compete on a regular schedule with seasons. They have to take matches as they come along, and without a roster to rely on if they get injured, this means that they don’t get paid if they can’t compete. It might seem like I’m being overly dramatic, but fighters can’t rely on a steady source of income outside of fighting, and a close decision loss can mean their pay is reduced in half, and if they aren’t particularly exciting or a favorite, they can see their rankings tumble down without justification. Jon Fitch had a 16 fight win streak heading into his title fight against Georges St. Pierre, but after the loss, he was sent to the prelims in his very next fight, facing off against Akihiro Gono, a PRIDE veteran who was 1 and 1 in the UFC and coming off a loss against Dan Hardy. These decisions matter a great deal, and can’t be handled lightly.

There are some fans out there already who are parroting tired out talking points, so let’s dissect them one by one.

The most popular one is “you have to take the title from the champion in order to win if you’re a challenger.” The obvious problem with this is that nowhere in ANY of the rules for MMA is this written, and if you’re a sport vying for legitimacy, rules are something you have to abide by. Imagine an NFL team that was the previous year’s Superbowl winner. That would mean that any team that faces them afterwards would have to do it in a blowout, or else a close game would mean that any ruling would favor the previous champions. It’s silly but this is the logic that we apply to combat sports. If you win by the scoring metrics that are set by the promotion and the athletic commission, then that means you won. This feeds nicely into the second most popular talking point..

“You shouldn’t coast in a title fight.” The fights themselves are broken into rounds, and each round is given equal importance. Despite commentators and pundits talking about “championship rounds”, they aren’t placed in higher value, and they’re not scored differently either. So if one fighter has secure more rounds, let’s say the first three, even if they lose the last two, they should be declared the winner (outside of one of the last two rounds being scored a 10-8 against them). Just by using basic math alone, 3 is greater than 2. If you changed the criteria altogether and say that the later rounds should be scored higher, then fine, Jones could be declared the winner without controversy. BUT THAT’S NOT HOW IT’S CURRENTLY SCORED, making that point entirely moot. Speaking of which, the third most popular tired talking point is..

“If the fight was scored as a whole, Jones is the clear winner.”

Regardless of who you thought won between Jones and Reyes, the numbers don’t lie. Reyes outlanded Jones in the first three rounds, 23 to 17, 33 to 22, and 27 to 10, respectively. Jones went 0 for 4 in takedowns during the first three rounds, meaning it wasn’t until the 4th and 5th that he landed any. Not enough stats? Here’s some more. As a whole, Reyes landed 119 total strikes compared to Jones’s 107, and when you break that down to significant strikes, Reyes landed 116 to Jones’s 104. If you look at the fight in it’s entirety, then Reyes still beats Jones by the numbers. Some are pointing out that Jones had a higher accuracy, but THAT’S NOT ONE OF THE SCORING CRITERIAS. It’s no different than you stating a fighter “looks meaner” or “has better tattoos”, so they should be judged more favorably.

Scoring a fight is tough, I get it. But it doesn’t mean that you can hide behind it as a shield. Figure skating and gymnastics are also hard to score, but they have a better scoring criteria and judges who are more competent to make sure that there’s less outright robberies. The judges themselves have to be held to a higher standard, or else nothing will get done. I realize that this is a plea that has been made quite often, but nothing seems to get done. Look, judging is hard, but it shouldn’t be this difficult to get some clear answers on what constitutes a winner. Judge Solis gave Jones a dominant 49 to 46 score card mainly because he was advancing and Reyes was on his back feet, countering. But if that’s the case, how was it that Carlos Condit was able to beat Nick Diaz, who had largely the same game plan of moving backwards and countering on a pressuring Nick Diaz? The first Shogun Rua vs Lyoto Machida fight also had a largely backpedaling Machida winning a decision against the more aggressive Rua, who utilized smart low kicks on Machida’s trailing lead leg and used controlled blitzes whenever there was a lull in action. How are those fights scored for the guy with less octagon control, but this time around it wasn’t?

Let’s say you use the argument for scoring the fight as a whole. How do you explain the first Dan Henderson vs Shogun Rua fight? Henderson won the first three handidly, but lost the last two pretty badly. Henderson spent the last round in full mount absorbing untold amounts of damage, but because of his lead in the first three rounds, he was given the unanimous decision win, scoring 48-47 on all three judges scorecard.

There is no consistency to be seen, other than judges can’t be relied on, and that’s a bad thing. Solis not only gave Jones the lopsided decision, but earlier in the evening, he gave Andre Ewell a 30-27 in a split decision verdict over Jonathan Martinez. No media outlet had a similar 30-27 score. Who knows, maybe it’s a Houston thing. Back in 2009, Paulie Malignaggi fought Juan Diaz at the same Toyota center and although ever major outlet had Malignaggi winning by 7 rounds to 5, all three judges scored it for Diaz. It caused Malignaggi to go on a rant, loudly stating in his post fight interview that quote on quote, “boxing is full of shit…and the only reason I do this is because it gives me a good payday.” That same sentiment can be said about MMA.

Last but not least, one of the things that should be called out is the biased commentary. It was clear that Rogan had a favorite, and Cruz was trying his best to give Reyes credit where it was due. The fight was painted in favor for Jones by Rogan, but he still seemed shocked when Jones was given the decision win. Either he should come clean and state that he thought Jones was better in the fight and can see how he got such a wide sweep in the score cards, or do a better job during the fight itself and show less bias and stop throwing in weird language that paints one fighter as superior to another.

As for what comes next for both fighters, it seems that the fair thing to do would be a rematch. Reyes proved that even with a less than ideal developmental period, he can give the champion all he can handle. Jones showed that he even though he may be slowing down, he’s still good enough to hang onto the title. One of the things that should be halted (at least momentarily) is talks of Jones moving up to heavyweight. Against someone his own size (and possibly better athletically), Jones had difficulty controlling and doing damage. How would he fare against actual heavyweights who can utilize their size and power effectively? Curtis Blaydes can match his wrestling pedigree, Francis Ngannou can literally knock anyone out in an instant, and both Daniel Cormier and Stipe Miocic are effective boxer-wrestlers that can seamlessly combine both elements effectively well. If an immediate rematch against Reyes isn’t in the works, Jones can face off against the winner of Corey Anderson vs Jan Blahowitz. As for Reyes, some time off to sharpen his skills or another 5 round fight could do wonders for him, especially considering his pacing issues against Jones.

The next big UFC PPV event is Adesanya vs Romero, and that fight promises to deliver fireworks.