Fight Study 69 – UFC 251 (transcript) (Patreon)

UFC 251 has officially wrapped up on Yas Island, and we have two champions that have successfully defended their titles and a new bantamweight champion. Due to the fact that all title fights went to the fifth round, the pay-per-view went much later than normal broadcasting times. If only the UFC could have known of this possibility, they might not have run into such time constraints. What’s that? They actually put on three title fights on the same card last year at UFC 245? And THREE of the FOUR fighters on the UFC 251 card were also part of UFC 245? Man, the promotion really needs to get better about learning from past mistakes. Even though the fights went the distance, we were at least treated to some great fights (mostly). At the top of the card, Kamaru Usman defended his welterweight title against Jorge Masvidal in a clear cut decision win. Alexander Volkanovski defeated Max Holloway in a rematch by the narrowest of margins, with many fans claiming that Holloway did more than enough to win. And rounding out our title fights, Petr Yan beat Jose Aldo by TKO in the fifth round to become the new UFC men’s bantamweight champion.

Also, Rose Namajunas defeated Jessica Andrade by split decision, evening their records against each other and possibly setting up a trilogy down the line.

Let’s take a look at these fights, starting with the main event.

Going into this fight, a lot has been made about Masvidal stepping in on six days’ notice against Usman, who has thus been perfect in the UFC without any real stumbling blocks to speak of. Masvidal was heading into this fight without a proper training camp, 20+ pounds over the welterweight title limit, and he wouldn’t have his head coach there to guide him in between the rounds. If this was an inspirational sports movie, Masvidal might have found a way to win. Unfortunately this is real life, and real life has some truths that you can’t overcome. Usman has been training for his title fight since February, and even though the locations and opponents have changed, he knew that being the champion he was always going to be one variable that would remain constant. It definitely showed in this fight.

Masvidal’s best chance at winning this fight on such late notice is to catch Usman early and put him out while on the feet. If that didn’t work, there were still avenues to victory that played in his favor. Masvidal is one of the best body kickers in the division and he doesn’t let the fear of the takedown deter him from throwing them. He’s shown improved clinch work in the Diaz fight, and definitely had some moments where he was able to hurt Usman when he broke off the clinch early. Every time they were in the middle of the cage, Masvidal always seemed like he was one big connection away from winning. Usman knew what his strengths are and relied heavily on them.

After a great round one, it appeared that Masvidal shifted back to his old self. For those of you who may not be familiar with Masvidal’s career as a whole, let me explain. Masvidal was always a supremely talented striker on the feet with slick head movement and combination punching. His ability to stuff the takedown and defend with submissions were also the stuff of nightmares for wrestlers who had trouble trying to keep him down and had to worry about their necks. However, this version of Masvidal was prone to winning the early rounds only to shift into cruise control as time wore on. His record is littered with split decision losses that he’ll argue he rightfully won despite the “L”, and it’s definitely possible that if a few fights went his way, he might have gotten the UFC title shot earlier in his career. That version of Masvidal unfortunately resurfaced during this fight, but it’s hard to tell if its his old habits creeping up again or his late notice conditioning keeping him from exerting more energy. PRIDE had a lot of exciting fights due to fighters being put on the card very last minute, especially the opponents of fighters who the promotion wanted to build up. What better way to stack the deck in your favor than by giving your budding stars a full camp and bringing in someone on two weeks notice who probably will struggle just with the weight cut? Andre “Dida” Amado’s last three fights in Japan came with less than 10 days notice, so he decided to redline in round one since he knew he didn’t have the gas tank to win a decision. Masvidal might have been in a similar situation where he knew that if he didn’t win early, he would be limited to bursts of striking activity just so he has the energy to defend himself until the final bell.

For the most part, Usman controlled this fight. After a frenetic round one, Usman was able to crowd Masvidal towards the fence, reaching with his hands and changing levels until he was close enough to clinch and hammer him with blows. Hooks to the body, shoulder strikes to the jaw, and stomps to the left foot were Usman’s go-to moves, and even though it may not have been the most exciting way to win, he built up such a lead with strikes that the numbers looked lopsided. It didn’t help that Usman kept pounding the midsection of Masvidal, causing him to gas out as the fight continued to the later rounds. Yes, Masvidal accepted this fight on short notice, he didn’t have a proper camp, but there’s no denying that the strikes to the midsection definitely took the wind out of his sails and caused his activity levels to drop. As mentioned in the preview, it’s not so much that Usman is building up momentum as the fight goes on, his slow-and-steady approach just overwhelms opponents to the point where their effectiveness is drowned out by fatigue. Usman just doesn’t seem to tire, and even though he took some kicks by Masvidal flush to the body, he kept the pressure up and constantly led Masvidal towards the fence.

By the fifth round, it was clear that Masvidal needed a knockout or submission to win. This also happened to be when Masvidal was exhausted and even if his strikes were quick, his flat footed approach gave away his energy levels. Usman was able to take Masvidal down and keep him there for most of the round, sealing the fight in his favor.

When the judges scorecards were read, there was no surprise in either fighter. Even though there were some harsh words exchanged between the two, after the final bell there was a lot of mutual respect. For Usman, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of top contenders once you get past Gilbert Burns and Leon Edwards. If he’s successful against both, he can do what GSP did and start a rematch tour against opponents he already beat, only if they’re able to build up a nice win streak. Or not, Jose Aldo fought on this card and he was coming off two losses, there’s not a lot of real consistency here. For Masvidal, he has somewhat of an excuse already built in. He took the fight on less than a weeks notice and “saved this card.” It’s possible that he built some kind of rematch clause into his new fight deal with the UFC, or he made a substantial amount of this fight alone that he can afford to wait out and see how the division shakes up.

Remember, Masvidal’s value is his ability to draw in the casual fans and sports media, he can disappear until 2021 and people will still be extremely interested in his fights. Even if Usman goes on to beat Burns and Edwards, some people will still fervently believe that a full camp Masvidal would’ve wrecked Usman, and will pay good money to see it. Granted, Masvidal with a proper training camp and notice could give Usman a much tougher fight, but it’s also very possible that a rematch could go exactly the same. Keep in mind that Masvidal isn’t the only one that said yes to the fight, Usman did as well. If he decided to be like Jon Jones and decide that a last minute opponent isn’t worth the risk and opts out, the UFC has no choice: the match is off. Usman said yes to someone that stylistically is completely different from Burns and he would get no credit either way. If Masvidal were to win, there is almost no way he could get a rematch on time. Masvidal could say, “I beat you with no notice, no camp, and no coaches. Go take a hike, I’m going to give Nate Diaz his rematch first.” And even in victory, people can claim that he beat someone that wasn’t training for a fight. Such is the life of an underappreciated champion.

Speaking of which, this leads us to the rematch between Alexander Volkanovski and Max Holloway, in which Volkanovski won by split decision (48-47 on two judges scorecards). Despite being the champion, Volkanovski felt like he was the challenger heading into this fight. Perhaps it was because he didn’t think the fans respected him enough, or it was Holloway’s flippant attitude towards the loss. Whatever the case was, Volkanovski was dead set on proving that he was the superior fighter. On paper, all the decks were stacked in his favor. He seemed to have Holloway well-scouted the first time around, and he definitely has the skills and athleticism to last all five rounds. On top of all that, Holloway claimed that he did his entire fight camp with zero sparring and entirely over Zoom calls. Now, at Southpaw, we talk about how fighters can succeed by dialing down on their hard training and limiting the amount of sparring that they do. With that said, it seemed almost foolish to train over the internet and not do the rounds with training partners. My god, were Rener and Ryron Gracie right? Can you become a world class fighter, possibly CHAMPION, by training online?? Is Zoom the future of fight camps?

The answer is no, of course not. Holloway was already a former champion that has done dozens of high level fight camps and clocked in countless sparring rounds and has the fight acumen to prove it. As of this recording, he has yet to come out and say that his earlier claims were all a lie, that he actually quarantined himself with his partners and they’ve been training nonstop. Without any other piece of evidence we can point to otherwise, we’ll have to take Holloway at his word. And what do you do know, he almost pulled it off. Or he did pull it off, depending on how you scored that fight.

It’s clear that no matter what way you looked at it, Holloway won the first two rounds. In their first fight, Holloway seemed content early on to absorb the leg kicks and let Volkanovski land them and move out the way. Volkanovski was also able to constantly keep Holloway turning and kept him from unloading with volume. And of course, we can’t forget how Volkanovski took a chapter of Holloway’s book and loaded with feints to keep Holloway from getting the right reads. The second time around, Holloway’s team seemed to have fixed a lot of his issues. As mentioned in the preview, instead of chasing Volkanovski, Holloway opted to let Volkanovski come to him whenever he wanted to attack. Wanderlei Silva confused Cung Le in their match-up by moving backwards and letting Le move forward, only to blast him up the middle with hooks and knees. Holloway did something similar by pressuring Volkanovski, but never staying within striking range. When Volkanovski did throw leg kicks, Holloway did one of three things: return with a kick of his own, withdrew his lead leg, or punched down the center. By constantly returning fire or reacting right away, Volkanovski wasn’t given the opportunities he needed to reset and get in a better position.

People forget that even though Holloway has great hands, his kicks aren’t bad either. Every time he engaged in kicking with Volkanovski, he kept him from lunging in with punches immediately after. We even saw a return of the spinning kicks from Holloway! Another cool area of improvement we saw from Holloway was him throwing kicks and following up with punches from the same side. This was a favorite of Andy Ristie over at Glory, and Gilbert Burns has a lot of success with it over in MMA. When Volkanovski got impatient and lunged in, Holloway was able to greet him with intercepting knees and uppercuts. The preview specifically mentioned this move and how even though Holloway was successful with it, he didn’t throw it nearly enough. I’m not claiming that Holloway paid for the preview and took it to heart, but there’s always the possibility that someone in his camp got their hands on it and went over possible strategies. Holloway also had success by NOT leading with his jabs as frequently. It seems blasphemous, especially given that Holloway attributes a lot of his wins by leading with the jab, but this time around he was more conservative with his lead hand. He seemed to realize from the first fight that he was planting his feet every time he wanted to throw it, which gave Volkanovski the opportunity to kick his lead leg. One neat approach that Holloway took to getting on the inside was raising his lead leg and stomping down to close the distance without having to take a low kick. As he pressed down, he was now much closer to Volkanovski and could throw punches in bunches. It was more common in the second fight to see Holloway commit to his combination punches on the inside and finish them off with a hook or an uppercut. All in all, he was able to get a better read on Volkanovski this time around and didn’t give him the reactions he wanted.  Holloway got Volkanovski good and frustrated early on and he was running into punches and missing with his jabs. Both rounds one and two were capped off by Volkanovski getting dropped by Holloway, one by a kick and another by an uppercut.

Holloway was definitely doing all the right things, so how was it that Volkanovski still kept his title? It really comes down to how you scored that third round, and just like Petr Yan from earlier in the night, Volkanovski was able to make the necessary micro-adjustments to fix his striking and remain competitive. Since Holloway was defending the lead leg kick well, Volkanovski started doubling and tripling up his kicks to throw off the timing of Holloway. Volkanovski also wasn’t as successful with the staggered drop shift. Holloway got hit with it clean the first fight, but this time around he moved out immediately whenever Volkanovski started to move his feet and stance switch. Having the fight IQ that he does, Volkanovski adjusted to this by removing his pause and just hammered in with his right hand lead. This was also a good way for him to close the distance and clinch Holloway, a favorite move of Fedor Emilianenko.

Another good tool that saw a lot of usage in the later rounds was the lead left hook from Volkanovski. Whenever he would throw a 1-2, instead of trying for a clinch or moving out of the way, Volkanovski finished off his combos with the left hook or stepped in with them whenever Holloway got too close without setting up his kicks. Finally, what seemed to really work in Volkanovski’s favor was mixing in more takedowns after angling out from the side. This kept Holloway from landing more head kicks and we saw that disappear from Holloway mostly after round 3. You can argue that the takedowns didn’t do much and were just used to stall, but its hard to deny that they were effective. Yes, Holloway was able to defend most of the takedowns and when he was taken down, he popped back up. However, those still do count as offense and whenever Holloway has to defend, he’s not actively on offense.

Many fans scoring at home seemed to think Holloway did enough to win back the belt, and there’s a strong argument for that. However, the official decision still stands with Volkanovski as the winner, and it’s a tough spot for both the champion and the challenger. For Volkanovski, fans and other fighters can claim that he’s not the real champion, Holloway beat him in the last fight. Unless they do a third fight in the near future, this doesn’t seem to be close to getting resolved. For Holloway, he’s lost two in a row to the same guy, and he’s cleared up most of the division. What does he do, pick off contenders until he’s built a two or three fight win streak and challenge again for the title? Does he move up to lightweight? Even though we were given a great fight, the paths forward for both Volkanovski and Holloway are a bit murky.

Next, we have Petr Yan vs Jose Aldo. Petr Yan defeated Jose Aldo by TKO in the fifth round to become the new men’s bantamweight champion. It’s arguable that there were more deserving contenders for the vacant title than Aldo, and I’m not disagreeing. In a weight class as stacked as the men’s 135 pound division, there was no real reason to have someone that’s 0-2 fight for a belt. The reason we were put in this odd spot is actually also because of the person that vacated the strap, Henry Cejudo. Before he fought Dominick Cruz, Cejudo felt that Aldo did enough to win his fight against Marlon Moraes. With tentative plans to build another great fight card in Brazil, Aldo was slated to fight Cejudo on May 9th at UFC 250. Keep in mind, this was all pre-COVID-19, so it was long before the final fight card we got. Aldo was pulled from the card due to visa issues traveling from Brazil, and the promotion needed someone to fill in last minute. It turned out Dominick Cruz was somehow available and got the jump on everyone else in the division, but they also left Aldo out to dry. Not willing to let Aldo’s training camp go to waste, they promised him a fight against the winner of the Cejudo vs. Cruz match-up. Cejudo wrecked those plans by promptly retiring, but he did set the stage for Yan vs Aldo. So that’s how we got this fight.

Some fans were surprised to hear that Yan and Aldo have actually fought before, albeit in sparring sessions. When Aldo was preparing for Frankie Edgar the second time around, he flew Yan down to Brazil as a training partner and the word was that he was able to get the better of him during their sessions. However, this was four years ago and a lot of things change in MMA. Not to mention this was when Aldo was at featherweight. Early on, it was fascinating to see how Aldo would deal with fighters at 135. He was already a man that was having difficulties cutting to featherweight, how was he going to handle an additional ten pounds? To the surprise of many, he seemed to be doing alright with the drop in weight. He had a good fight against Moraes and in the early rounds against Yan, he still retained a lot of his speed and reactions. He had quick jabs that worked down the center of Yan’s guard and we even saw him return to low kicking his opponents. By timing Yan as he moved, Aldo was able to sweep him off his feet in round one. It looked like the Aldo of old! At least for a little bit.

The signs of trouble seemed to start late in round one. Even though he was having success with his strikes, Aldo’s cut down to bantamweight clearly left him with less natural defenses. When I say that, I’m talking about his ability to take punishment from attacks. We all see how badly dehydration affects fighters, giving them problems with their output, their chin, and susceptibility to body strikes. Late in the first round, Aldo seemed to take a kick to the body that hurt him, and made him decide not to take any more chances on the feet. He shot in for a takedown and then pulled guard from the pain. The replay only showed the punches that landed to Aldo’s ribs when he was already on the ground, but the body kick he absorbed played a factor. When you’re already cutting so much weight to make the limit, anything beyond your normal water weight starts to affect your organs.

The second round seemed to give Aldo a much needed revival, and he started off like he was competing at the Lumpinee stadium. Aldo would blast Yan with low kicks, so much so that he started to switch stances. This didn’t seem to bother Aldo that much, he adjusted by throwing round kicks to Yan’s body and hammering him with uppercuts and hooks to the midsection. Knowing that this is a title fight, it was smart of Aldo to invest in body strikes to try and tire out Yan for the later rounds. Unfortunately, Yan was better than Aldo expected and just like Volkanovski, Yan was able to make the adjustments needed to win.

It’s true that the leg kicks bothered Yan enough that he switched to southpaw, but it’s not as if he’s terrible from that stance. In fact, Yan was able to land kicks of his own in that open stance to Aldo’s body. Instead of throwing with the jab-straight from orthodox, Yan simply changed it to jab-straight from southpaw. One way he was able to get on the inside of Aldo was throwing alternating hooks while shifting his stance, a favorite of another Russian fighter, Igor Vovchanchyn. Yan also raised his leg before stepping in, taking the sting off Aldo’s kick while allowing him to close the distance. It’s possible that the weight cut effects started to kick in during round four, but that’s when Aldo started to slow down significantly. Round three was fairly back and forth, but Yan absorbed a lot of strikes on his forearms and shoulders, a la Rafael dos Anjos in his fight against Anthony Pettis. Aldo still relies heavily on his head movement to avoid strikes, but he can be overwhelmed by feints and being forced to move. Holloway and Volkanovski were both able to get him to work past his usual pace and tired him out. Yan’s forward pressure got Aldo to strike at his body, which he responded with combination strikes that Aldo couldn’t perfectly defend without letting a few punches slip through. It could also be that as the fight went on, Aldo’s strikes became less effective since Yan seemed to have no problem chasing Aldo without a real fear of a knockout blow. Knowing that Aldo was slowing down, Yan’s commitment to combination striking along with constant fleet footed movements seemed to get Aldo to drop his defenses.  

In the final round, a big 1-2 from southpaw hurt Aldo, but the way he was looking, any hard punch might have done him in. Once Yan followed up with a short uppercut, Aldo was dropped and Yan was all over him. We were then treated to an uncomfortable scene as Aldo absorbed tons of strikes from Yan without properly defending himself. At one point, it looked as if Yan was intentionally pulling his punches to keep from hurting Aldo further, but referee Leon Edwards was determined to give Aldo every possible opportunity to get out of harms way, or he placed a lot of money on that fight going the distance. After absorbing more than a hundred strikes too many, eventually the fight was halted and Yan was crowned the new men’s bantamweight champion.

As stated before numerous times, the men’s 135 pound division is stacked with killers. Yan isn’t exactly going to have an easy title reign, there are guys like Aljamain Sterling, Cody Garbrandt, Marlon Moraes, and Cory Sandhagen waiting in the wings. You also have exciting up and comers like Song Yadong and Sean O’Malley just waiting for their turn. There almost doesn’t seem to be a bad fight you can make in this division, and if the UFC was smart they’d put Yan vs Sterling on a card sometime before the year’s end.

For Aldo, he’s now in the same spot as Yoel Romero. He’s lost three in a row, but all to tough champions. His age isn’t doing him any favors and he’s definitely a shoe-in for the hall of fame when the time comes. But right now, as of this moment, he doesn’t have a lot of great options ready. He can opt for another fight to prove that he’s still dangerous in the division, but it’s hard to see him becoming a champion again when he has to cut so much every time. If Aldo is still adamant about fighting, he can get some fun match-ups against guys like Rob Font, or be fed to up-and-comers to gauge their readiness for the next step. Neither sound like the proper send-off to someone of Aldo’s caliber, but the fight game is known for cannibalizing its own to feed the young.    

Finally, let's talk about the much-anticipated rematch between Jessica Andrade vs. Rose Namajunas with the winner possibly getting a crack at current strawweight champion Weili Zhang.

What's interesting is that in their first fight, Andrade was the favorite. In the rematch, even though Andrade won the first fight, she was the betting underdog.

So what changed between their first fight and the rematch? Weili Zhang. Both Namajunas and Joanna Jędrzejczyk showed you can counter Andrade as she comes in, and Zhang perfected that counter. Since Andrade didn't seem like she was improving all that much, people felt the script was out and since Namajunas did so well the first time around, surely she could follow the same script without getting slammed this time.

And to her credit, she did mostly. She won the fight, but again the fight didn't go as expected.

First off, Andrade came into the fight with new head movement. It's new because she never showed head movement before. She was a constant moving target. She also began to throw body shots when she had opportunities, along with leg kicks.

She also stopped wading in with blind hooks like before.

But now with more defensive options, long-range tools like low kicks, and body shots when Namajunas came in, Andrade was fighting from distance, which doesn't work that well when you have a height and reach disadvantage.

So though Namajunas was landing less in this fight than she did in their first fight, she was still picking Andrade apart from the outside.

Namajunas also began to steer Andrade around the cage. As Andrade followed, Namajunas would change directions and hit her.

As Andrade followed, Namajunas would pivot and hit her.

Andrade still had the bad habit of lifting her head and standing tall before she rushed in for an attack. This became an easy tell for Namajunas to counter.

For Namajunas, she also adapted by applying some of the same techniques Jędrzejczyk did against Andrade, which was to use shoves and stiff arms to maintain distance.

Andrade did her best work initially using slips to attack with combos, ripping to the body then following up to the head. What Andrade showed in her fight with Jędrzejczyk and even in her previous fight with Namajunas was an inability to adapt to the striking. And that's how this fight looked like it was unfolding.

But towards the end of round 2 and all of round 3, Andrade adapted. Surprisingly, she adapted better than Namajunas did. She recognized that Namajunas was setting everything up off of her jab. She also realized after she jabbed, she would use a weave to change directions. That's when Andrade began to intercept her with uppercuts.

She also recognized because of the reach disparity and her inability to close in on Namajunas, she had to apply a strategy Weili Zhang often employs, which is to try to hit simultaneously as your opponent is hitting you. Then you know you're in range, you just have to land harder. So every time Namajunas threw, Andrade threw. Except since Andrade was constantly slipping and being much more defensively minded, it ended up with Namajunas getting hit with the harder shots while Andrade avoided much of the damage. And if Namajunas was just faking a jab, Andrade would make her pay.

Andrade would come in under the jab with uppercuts, land her own much stiffer jab, land left hooks, and eventually counter her jab with a right cross. A right straight is when you use it offensively, a right cross is the same punch but used as a counter that crosses over your opponent's jab. Hence, right cross. And that's what rocked Namajunas, resulting in a clinch, where Andrade threw her down. She wasn't able to finish Namajunas and Namajunas eventually worked herself back to the feet. Andrade clearly won that round but lost the first two rounds.

It was an impressive performance by both women, and Namajunas proved she was the number one contender, while Andrade proved she can improve and get better. Not just from fight to fight, but in the fight as well. If Namajunas can beat Zhang, this could possibly set up a trilogy match, this time once again for the title. But that's IF she can beat Zhang which is a tall order because Zhang is someone who consistently gets better fight to fight and from round to round within the fight. Kind of like retired champion Henry Cejudo.

So that's a lot of MMA we covered. Hope you all got a lot out of this. Hope you all are learning from this. And don't forget to check out our previews of upcoming fights on Patreon where we really go in-depth into fighter careers. You can listen to the previews and visualize the techniques we're talking about or you can read the article which incorporates short clips of the techniques we're talking about. You can also find the transcript for this Fight Study on Patreon as well.