Watching Khabib feint the take down and drop McGreggors guard was an eye opener. it never occured to me that a double leg is kind of like a jab in alot of situations.
Even more so; every single movement you make can be used as a feint (which is what I think you mean), the game is about stealing time as well as distance. For instance, if your leg kick is to be respected, that opens up the opportunity to use the beginning of that movement as a feint, the same can be said for anything within your arsenal.
Khabib has better striking than Conor. He was outstriking and outpositioning him with footwork before he was even successful with a takedown. Khabibs boxing is better. Boxing allowed the wrestling in that fight not the other way around. MMA striking sucks because the fans and the lower level strikers are stupid and can only understand what they see when they see someone take their opponent down everything else they are blind to
If you take striking out of grappling you get slick amazing grappling but a lot of positions, techniques, transitions emerge that completely expose you to strikes. The grappling may be more sophisticated but it isn't necessarily better for fighting. You take the grappling out striking and the level of refinement and technique in striking starts to become specialized the same way it does in grappling. It's more sophisticated striking but it's not grappling aware and therefore puts in you bad positions for takedowns. That's kind of the point of MMA, there's a balance here where each discipline on their own is a bit exposed if let to marinate in its own juices too long. The style vs style attribute of Gracie Jiu Jitsu is what allowed them to construct such a streamlined art. BJJ/Submission Grappling has moved past Gracie Jiu Jitsu in terms of technique level for sure (if you are talking sport grappling) but it's becoming a sport. MMA took that philosophy of the Gracies and its evolved light years. So from the Gracies you have the derived sport grappling which is probably slicker grappling then GJJ but less general purpose fighting and you have the derived fighting style of MMA which obviously combines with other martial arts to be a superior form of combat sport. A lot of people like to diss the Gracies' but I think you'd have to say, their influence is unmistakable and they set in motion both sport submission grappling and MMA even though classic Gracie Jiu Jitsu probably wouldn't win either on its own anymore.
Bruce Lee was also a big name in developing Western MMA philosophy and Japan had Shooto which the Fight looked like modern amateur MMA fights years before the first UFC. So they are a big part of it but they weren't the first and I think a lot of people don't like the Gracie's is because a lot of them aren't humble.
@@killaben85 Shooto gets a little muddy because their pro wrestling influence and dodgy fights at times means some of those fights weren't necessarily fights, more "performances". Pancrase predates UFC as a mixed martial arts promotion, and the concept of martial artists competing against different styles predates the sport elements by hundreds if not thousands of years.
@@killaben85 The Gracie's were developing their style 60 years before Bruce Lee was doing Martial Arts. There's no question that questions about 'what's the best style' have been asked in countries all over the world.
Bryan, your point is really crucial I think. If you look at BJJ, it's clear that it is becoming increasingly removed from MMA as well as realistic fighting (i.e. self-defense), with ever more complicated techniques (and an infinite amount of guards). In a way, the same happened with other sports like judo, karate and taekwondo when they became (Olympic) sports. And as you say, the same is also true for wrestling, where striking is not allowed. After being assaulted in my youth, my interest has always been self-defense, and I tend to look at martial arts through that lens. People can say a lot about the Gracies, but they have always considered self-defense an essential part of BJJ, and competition-focused gyms (which is probably most BJJ gyms nowadays) have taken self-defense out of the curriculum. My GF competes in BJJ, and she often shows me techniques and I often think: "I would have punched you in the face twenty times already." People who train only BJJ no longer train against striking, so they're not as prepared for a punch to the face. For self-defense (and MMA) there is just no good reason to spend so much time on techniques that complicated and risky. But to beat a good grappler, your grappling needs to be increasingly refined. The same with boxing and kickboxing. Then again, even though MMA is (in my opinion) still the best preparation for realistic self-defense, you'd need other skill sets as well. MMA does not prepare you to deal with multiple attackers and weapons, which are not uncommon in situations of violent assault. People train for different reasons; my girlfriend trains for BJJ competitions and not self-defense. She doesn't care about self-defense. MMA practitioners may also be more interested in competitions rather than self-defense scenarios. Perhaps the best thing is to cross train (go to different gyms that specialize in different arts, e.g. a judo, BJJ, boxing, kickboxing and muay thai gym) but who has that much time and money? We all need to prioritize I guess.
@@lordtains You and me definitely sound like minded. Yeah I was careful to refer to MMA as a combat sport because as you point out, there's a lot of real world fighting scenarios that don't involve single fighters, fighters being of the same size, fighters training to a physical peak on a certain date, a ref, a neutral and mostly safe fighting surface, the expectation of rules, etc, etc. I still would think that a skilled MMA trained fighter would probably be in the best position to 'conduct combat' than just about anyone else but the obvious difference is that in a sport you can study your opponent and implement a game plan. Where as in a total riot I would think speed and just 'not stopping' would win out over '.... wait for him him to circle left has he retreats... wait for it, counter... wait, there it is...' type fighting. And I totally hear your point about cross training everything. I for one have a family and a day job. So time is a premium. I like BJJ because of the resisting opponent aspect and because I have a bad knee that makes stand up fighting (kicking or judo throws) impossible. I think the main thing is just understanding that it's drifting into being a sport. It would certainly help me in a fight, but it isn't the golden ticket it once was. But hey, at least it's not a soft as Karate, Kung Fu, Aikido, etc that have you punching air and countering against opponents who freeze and let you execute complicated techniques. That's why I enjoy Rokus' channel. His journey has some similarities with mine (though he's actually fighting so he's well surpassed me for sure).
Totally agree with Icy Mike. The threat of the takedown can turn an opponent from an elite striker into an amateur. Khabib was very mediocre on the feet, but had plenty of success standing up with some of the most elite strikers in the UFC.
That's where I disagree. Khabib was an extremely good striker. Of course most his success came due to take down threat... But what Icy Mike and you do wrong is that you consider boxing etc the ultimate striking. Boxing, Muay Thai etc is perfect striking for their respective ruleset. Many things that are considered advanced striking don't necessarily translate to a real fight. Footwork, headmovement etc are very different when knees, takedowns etc are a possibility. If Mike Tyson, Floyd, Canelo etc would fight MMA, their striking would look very different, but they are not suddenly worse strikers. We saw how DJ was keeping up with Muay Thai world champion. Many MMA fighters have outstanding striking, and even the ones that look sloppy like Khabib are great if you know what actually matters in striking. Truly bad strikers like Ben Askren are outliers at higher level
Nah , khabib head movement was extremely good. Go see how he was slipping punches from Dustin poirier who undoubtedly one of the greatest striker in UFC
@@thomass.4007 I think you’re a little confused, because you’re literally explaining my (and Mike’s) point perfectly. We are literally saying the same thing as you.
@@shahan1465 Because of the threat of his grappling. Khabib is the GOAT imo, but to imagine he could beat poirier, gaethje, conor, barboza etc in a strictly striking only match would be delusional. Khabib’s striking was excellent when the threat of the takedown was there, without the threat, his striking is mediocre.
@@253MC We do partly agree, the difference is that I don't think that Khabib is a mediocre striker. I think Khabib is a very solid striker (that gets even more dangerous due to the takedown threat.) We judge strikers on what we see in Boxing etc. But many of the advanced moves that we see in boxing are not that efficient, if kicks, knees, takedowns etc are allowed. So I disagree that many high level mma guys suck at striking and postulate, that Icy Mike and most ppl underestimate them, because they judge them from a wrong perspective. One more example: with boxing gloves it's easier to block, which means I have to use impressive footwork and slick counters to land my punches. People see that and believe I'm a great striker. With small gloves, I don't have to use that footwork, because it's much easier to land hits. Audience watching thinks I'm an amateur because no fancy footwork, and we get hit by each other all the time seemingly without effort. My point: Icy Mike and Fans misjudge MMA fighters, due to missing variables
Great points made in this video, and I remember a time when elite strikers ( pre UFC) assumed that their boxing combos, taekwondo kicks, or karate backfists were not only sufficient for competition and self protection, but the highest form for it ( depending upon their preferred style ). They were very dismissive towards grappling, and hence spent excessive time on superfluous movements only suited to the contest rings of their respective styles.
The reason for bad striking in MMA has to do with the hierarchy of skills. Pure grappling beats pure striking, therefore it makes more sense for a fighter to work more on his grappling.
@Wildcard "Bad" may be a bit strong, where as "less proficient" would be more apt. We are still talking about fighter athletic males, that can make up the difference in brute force. Even untrained men with enough weight will get KOs more often than not. I actually like to use Women's MMA as an example because the penalty for poor technique seems higher. Rousey's ability to dominate in part came from being able to tank sub par strikes to get inside. I fully expected Holm to be 1st to hit her properly having a boxing/kickboxing background. With all that back muscle of Rousey, I still expected a head kick to put her down. Probably don't have to say much about Nunes wrecking her down the line. Silva had a TMA background that included kick boxing before he moved to MMA.
@Big Simpin That's nonsense. The unified rules are biased towards strikers a lot more than grapplers. Consider: - Rounds. Every 5 minutes, you are stood back up. The striker can be taken down at minute 2 and then spend 3 minutes playing as defensively as he can and then the fight is stood back up for free. - Gloves. It's easier and safer to throw hard punches with a glove than without a glove. Gloves also hinder grappling. - The referee can stand people up or break a clinch if there's no action. But he doesn't put people down on the ground if there's lack of action in the standup. - Scoring. Arguable and has changed over the years, but today and generally speaking, significant strikes beat takedowns. Case in point, Askar Askarov vs Kai Kara France. Even the lack of knees on the ground is really not favoring grapples. If knees on the ground were allowed, who do you think would become more proficient with them - wrestlers or strikers? It would be wrestlers, who anyway spend more time on the ground. You notice how ground and pound is something wrestlers are good at? Allowing knees on the ground would be adding to the arsenal of the wrestlers. One of the greatest, wildest and most haphazard grappling-based MMA fighter - Masakazu Imanari - spent his career in an organization that allowed knees on the ground.
There are plenty of mix martial artist who come from a striking background, in fact there are and there have been many kick boxing legends competing in the sport since ever. I think that what you said is true but very badly put. The fact that MMA fighters have what appears to be bad striking, is because you're comparing it to other combat sport that focus on it. MMA striking level is getting really high in MMA, it has its own footwork and angles, I give you a practical example. You take a boxer and put him in the octagon, his stance is too wide and he is very exposed to leg kicks, his head movement is very dangerous cause he risks getting kicked in the face while lowering his head, his gloves are not there to cover him up so his defence would need some serious work. Does the boxer have a low level striking? You put an MMA fighter in a ring and he will look like an amateur, wrong footwork, wrong movements and angles, his striking is not low level, it's designed to work in another rule set.
Yeah that's fair. Yet you can still see wild overhead strikes being thrown here and there, and like Mike said, they can get away with it. It's just that even if you are good at striking, you can't over commit to it.
@@jestfullgremblim8002 the thing is, even wild looping overhand shots have their place on mma, especially when you're combining it with a takedown. You fake a shot and you throw a really wide overhand and your opponent will be concentrated on his center line to defend the shot, in such a way that his peripheral vision won't reach far enough to spot a wide overhand coming from the side. So it really really depends
Thanks, so I didnt have to write all this. The fact that the gloves are so small plus kicks and takedowns means you cant fight like a boxer or kick/muay thaiboxer. You cant spam kicks, the punishment for getting kicked caught and taken down is not worth it.
I agree with this. Because with the threat of a grappling situation I don't invest much time in learning to duck and roll with boxing strikes because if I'm going to be ducking or going low I want to take the initiative with grappling before the other person. It's natural in a street fight to hold a person while striking anyways so the rolling and ducking becomes obsolete while being held. All my fights were a chaotic mess of grabbing and striking but not anything very advanced. The simple stuff always works best.
Grappling becomes a threat only because most MMA fighters don't have good footwork, except for the wrestlers. But wrestlers weren't trained formally in striking. Grapplers will never grapple effectively if you have good footwork circling around them and changing directions constantly. Grapplers have to close the distance first before they can clinch or attempt a takedown. Look at the last match between Holly Holmes and Ronda Rousey. Most of the time Ronda Rousey couldn't touch Holly Holmes cause Holly Holmes had very good footwork and was able to maintain a good distance.
I don't think you can say that footwork that disregards takedown threats but increases punching power is better footwork, it's a different trade off. It's like BJJ guys claiming they are awesome at grappling but falling apart when punches are introduced.
MMA fighters suck at striking from a kickboxing/muay thai/boxing POV. Grappling for mma is also different from greco/freestyle/sport BJJ/ no-gi/judo etc... Just like how many of the best in grappling port over to mma and get out grappled and beat up on the bottom in an MMA context, good kickboxers come over in MMA and get knocked out (Gokhan Saki). Why? Because grappling and striking in an MMA context is different from grappling in BJJ or striking in glory rules kickboxing. If someone feints a takedown, and you react, you can get caught with a huge looping overhand which would never land in kickboxing or boxing. Is that shitty striking? No... it's a well set up shot using a takedown feint. It's striking for MMA.
Striking is really really hard. Skill wise, it feels like it's far more intuitive to get skilled at grappling than it is striking. Striking is something that is so simple yet so hard to master unless you start really young.
Pure grappling beats pure striking/boxing. That's true. HOWEVER... A good boxer/striker with just basic knowledge about grappling/wrestling can easily beat a grappler. And that's because the boxer doesn't need to have a black belt in BJJ to defeat a grappler. He only needs to know just the basic about how to avoid to be taken down to the ground. If the fight goes to the ground the boxer is lost, but if the boxer maintains himself on his feet is the grappler who is gonna suffer alot.
You can say the exact same thing about a grappler with competent striking. You don't need to train pure boxing or kickboxing for 5 years, you just need decent enough striking to close the distance on the striker. Almost like the best strategy in mixed martial arts is to mix martial arts or something.
That's true but we see that if you are good at wrestling, you can basically neutralize your opponent's wrestling and then simply beat them by your superior striking. Examples: petr yan, adesanya, robert whittaker, yoel romero, max holloway and so on
YES ! He touched on The Meta, which has a Huge Impact. The Meta of Takedowns and Grappling is so dominant it really is a waste of time to be focusing on footwork and striking. Not understanding the meta gets you into a lot of trouble and I don't see a meta-shift coming in anytime soon since it's just so effective.
Allow face-stomps, grounded knees to the head and head kicks on grounded opponents and see the meta shift over night. You are risking a takedown, having safety crawling on your ass towards the opponent if you don't get it is just plain weird. That should be a punishable moment in a striker vs grappler match, much like a wrestler can punish your lowkicks. And no, it's not more dangerous than getting elbowed on the mouth 12 times until you finally sleep in ground and pound. Also, before anyone mentions UFC1, cool, we get it. The game changed, now you ain't getting kimuras and armbars left and right by virtue of the enemy having never seen one and not knowing it's about to be match ending
@@unwaveringdiscipline5489 looks like someone doesn’t know about Pride FC 🤣 You introduce foot stomps,grounded knees,etc and guys like Khabib and other GnP specialists would murder strikers.
Well if people watched the early UFC's, they had more strikers than grapplers because most of the martial arts were about strikes. When Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and wrestling became the standard in MMA, grapplers were considered complete because the clinching and ground game. Also grapplers worked more on defending the strike than striking.
All the early UFC winners were grapplers. ALL of them except 3 because Royce had to withdraw and a backup guy who only had to fight the last match came in. This simply isnt true. BJJ and wrestling WERE IMMEDIATELY the standard exposing all the garbage strip mall karate dojos with self promoted black belts.
The other things to keep in mind are (1) training time and (2) what is the *actual overall* empirical performance of primarily MMA fighters in striking-only pro bouts. Regarding the first factor, it certainly is a strain for any MMA fighter to get anywhere near as much striking training in as a competitor in only a striking-only sport. Nevertheless, last I saw a compilation of MMA pro fighters' overall record in pro boxing, I was surprised to find--too-little discussed!--that the combined records had the MMA fighters ... batting right around .500 in win-loss ratio. When pro MMA fighters crossing over represent "an average pro" among pro boxers? That's not too shabby. :)
Striking for MMA is its own discipline. A wider stance is needed to defend the takedown, smaller gloves offer less protection from the high guard, and the threat of kicks/knees make low bobs and weaves a risky endeavour. Not to mention the fact that your opponent can also feint takedowns, or use feints to setup takedowns. I would argue that MMA fighters do not suck at striking, they excel at striking for MMA.
I think MMA striking needs to stop being compared to boxing, kickboxing or muy thai. These are all diffetent sports anf striking in MMA is its own thing. The most common striking arts are in a smaller ring giving less area to move around in this impacts striking alot. I dont think striking is bad in MMA its just a styke optomized for defense in other areas that all other martial arts font have to worry about so its seen as "bad"
A big problem with a lot of MMA fighters striking is their footwork, too many fighters back up in straight lines. Reason for this is because a lot of MMA gyms from what I've seen spar on open mats instead of in a cage so they don't develop the proper cage craft. I can count on one hand the amount of MMA fighters that are good at striking going forwards and backwards
@@kommisar. been following Icy Mike for a long time :) he's a damn good striking coach and a fun person....also sassy and knowledgeable, nobody said he was the ultimate fight expert ✌️
@@tomo2807 Have you actually watched his own fights? You can't tell me he's knowledgeable when he is so terrible. He's got a YT channel and a school. How does that make him an expert?
@@kommisar. don't like arguing in the comment section but sure let's go: Yes I watched all of them, because I used to watch street beefs a lot as at the time it was valuable for me to look into what mostly normal people look like when they fight and used it as a learning tool, when Mike fought over there he showed pretty rudimentary and basic stuff...so how is it possible for me to call him knowledgeable if he in your terms "sucks". It's actually a very simple fact which is: Fighter and a fighting coach are two different things. A good coach can epistemologically understand the field of martial arts and fighting on a high level and in depth without them being able to perform in practice what they understand in theory, they teach others (like Cliff) who then carry the fruit of the coaches labour. How many great UFC coaches have you actually seen fight in the UFC? Regardless, if you want to perform a credibility check on someone, you shouldn't focus on the person, you should focus on the Data, in this case it's what Mike says that is either right or wrong, not how he performs, here's an example of what I mean: he acknowledges the importance of grappling while he openly admits and showcases that he's not good at it... that's understanding the theory vs the practice, hence as I says he's sassy and knowledgeable Nobody ever said he was an insane world elite level fighter who's never wrong, you simply stated that he sucks and I disagree, all in all this is fun and I don't want to piss you off ✌️
I think this is a fundementally flawed take. That they have to adjust to the threat of the takedown doesn't make the striking "suck", it just makes it a different ballgame. It's like saying kickboxers suck at striking because they have to utilize different footwork from traditional boxing or something. That being said ofcourse if you have to split your time so the striking might not be as good as someone who trains solely striking but that doesn't mean it's bad and it's a different type of striking due to the fundamentally different nature of striking with the threat of takedowns.
I think you misunderstood the statement. Many people within the sport agree that MMA striking is inferior to high level boxing, kickboxing, muay Thai, etc. There are so many fighters who are gifted outside of striking that they get by without excelling at it. Damian Maia, Josh Koscheck, and Ryan Hall have all competed at a high level with mediocre at best striking. They are absolute demons on the ground but they never got to where high level strikers exist. The main thing that helps them with their striking is that they can threaten the takedown which creates interesting scenarios like when Khabib knocked down Conor.
If we are talking punches and kicks, you can spot the difference in technique between those that started in traditional MA, and MMA. Boxers are genuinely superior punchers, and further offset by conditioning for getting hit by other boxers. MMA guys don't have to be as proficient punchers among themselves, but average slobs that only know haymakers still have "success" too. Moving up the chain among men, you're just reducing the reliance on brute force with better technique through training. That said, I've watched a woman tank a haymaker from a stocky guy and basically go on to out box him, so he resorted to a double leg. He still ate a couple up kicks before running off. That was just 2 people in the street. I think women's MMA needs disproportionately better technique than Men's for knock outs. Rousey could just walk through shots until a proper striker put hands on her.
That's a pretty fair assessment. I think it leaves a little out but, I'll focus on this aspect. The over-focus on grappling has made MMA practitioners lose respect for proficient striking. Askren vs. Paul is a good example. Askren was the kind of fighter who ate shots in order to get to the takedown. How are you going to take someone down when their right hook puts you to sleep? On the street fighting / self-defense front, a dude once tried to single-leg me after failing to KO me with a sucker punch. I dropped my weight (e.g. sat on my punches), grabbed his hair, and "hockey punched" him until he stopped fighting back. By the end, my right hand was split open between the 3rd and 4th knuckle and responding officers thought I'd used a weapon until witnesses came forward to corroborate my claim of self-defense. The fight was ruled mutual combat because neither of us pressed charges. Side point, this is why you might want to consider conditioning your knuckles outside of gloves and wraps. My skin split open, but I didn't break my hand and that's somewhat important.
I feel like loosening the rules about kicking the head of a "grounded" opponent in MMA would shift the balance a lot more. Going to the ground is immediately a much greater risk when going for a takedown can easily get you kicked or kneed in the head if you mistime it. I guess full-on stomping would genuinely be too dangerous to allow, but I don't really think axe kicks or "soccer kicks" to the head of a downed or kneeling opponent are significantly more dangerous than kicks to head while standing TBH. Probably the second most frivolous "safety" ban after the 12-6 elbow.
Until someone gets injuried and people start calling for banning MMA again. The only safety rule it is wrong tight now is 12-6 elbow. In the end the sport needs its rule to have legimacy.
i think striking for MMA requires it's own specific timing and since MMA fighter train that specific timing for that specific discipline therefore good seasoned MMA fighter has a great timing under that specific ruleset, more often than that his timing would be better than that of boxer of kickboxer as he knows where and when fit that in and how to set it up for MMA and when is safe to do so. does that mean that they can compete and win under kickboxing or boxing ruleset with boxer or kickboxer? no, not at all(well maybe 1 out of 10 times), but under MMA rules yes very much so
There are a lot of mma fighters who’s striking is elite. It’s elite for mma. Like everyone is saying, grappling changes everything. Rodtang’s striking game was way different in round 1 compared to round 2 when he fought Demetrious in the mist Thai/ mma fight
In my utmost humble opinion. “ No rules without exception” Within all fields, there will always be outliers, that stated, when it comes to fighting in general, making absolutes and or generalizations/ blanket statements is usually not as clear cut, nor “And or”. We’ve seen top level mma athletes perform impeccably not only within their respective field, as we’ve also seen examples of practitioners( though they might be outliers ) but still, they are able to be competitive against the specialists within their own fields as well, and they perform undoubtedly pristinely when one takes into consideration that they are willingly stepping into another sport yielding to, and accepting said disadvantages( ie Boxing/ Bare knuckle/ Muay Thai/ kickboxing) And they are not only competitive, but in some occasions they are actually able to win. ( The most recent example I can think of is Demetrius Johnson vs Rodtang) As well as Anderson’s Silva’s recent boxing match, just to mention a few. Max Holloway is also one to take note of, his fight against Cattar was akin to observing death disguised in elegance, his performance would make any “ Pure” striker bow in acknowledging of what they were observing, he performed with such excellence, he moved and adapted with such impeccable timing that not only was he able to put on an clinic, but despite the threats of all the wrestling, he displayed ( At least in my opinion) One of the highest levels of striking that one can aspire to attain in an mixed martial arts setting where the grappling is an constant threat, and he still managed to nullify that, dominate and defined the proverb: “Timing is the essence of everything” It was truly beautiful to watch, such pristine technique, so again, I think mr Firaz Zahabi states it appropriately: “ There are levels to this game” I can see where Mike is coming from, and I can agree up to an certain point, but the fighters/ athletes are adapting and developing themselves in an unprecedented fashion, and they will only continue to further improve and become better as the sport continues to grow. Sincere regards. Fellow Martial Artist. Tom Framnes. Norway.
Anderson Silva isn't really a good example, because he isn't a "MMA striker". He started in TMA and transitioned to MMA after being in kickboxing. Silva came in to MMA a better striker than most.
I used the Rodtang Vs DJ example in my response as well. While Rodtang definitely did look leagues above DJ as a striker (despite DJ doing nicely at times), Rodtang suddenly became half the striker he was when you introduced the other elements in round 2. It's not so much people completing in MMA fights can't strike, it's more so the combination of elements make it hard to look like an elite striker. Rodtang going from an incredible pressure muay thai fighter, capable of mixing in every single element of his striking game, to snatching at counters off the back foot and having bad control of his range all in the space of one minute just highlights that it's very hard to look like an elite striker in MMA, but it doesn't mean you're not one.
Do they though ? (I know the title is intentionally provocative) But I think it's unfair to say they suck at striking. The striking in MMA is adapted to the ruleset. It's like saying they suck at Wrestling or BJJ, or anything because they are just not specialized and maybe couldn't equal champions of those disciplines... If you train for MMA you logically train what you need to win at this specific game, nothing less, nothing more. MMA is not Muay Thai+BJJ+Wrestling. It's a sport of its own, with its own skillsets, tactics and strategies. Yes it overlaps with other sports but that's all.
It is like saying water polo players suck at swimming because they are not as fast and they are often using their hand for other thing than swimming. Like reciving the ball and throw it. Calling them bad strikers dosen't make justice
This is why I’m wanting to be the best striker and be a master at grappling defense. I’m really wanting to actually use striking as a form of takedown defense, but I’ll learn that soon enough
@@ChazSeamus28 I wanna be the type of guy who defends a takedown with a knee or uppercut and make it work. Definitely gotta fully understand grappling defense to do it tho lol
I’m glad the common man isn’t as aware of using underhooks overhooks sprawls and head hands defense as they are at blocking dodging and throwing strikes. It would make life much harder for us wrestlers lol. I think all it is, is centuries of people ignoring wrestling and it’s come back to bite a lot of these people in the ass.
Comparing mma striking to boxing and muay thai is comparing apples and pears. They are completely different as they cater to the ruleset that they are used for. A good striker in mma won't fight like a muay thai fighter with a tall stance, and as for boxing in the pocket, it can be snuffed out immediately by engaging in a clinch. Id argue good strikers that want purely striking for mma looks more like a karate distance management style of fighting. (Wonderboy, mcgregor etc). The issue is that you are watching ring sports with no threat of takedown to indicate what good striking looks like.
the mma vs boxing mixed rules triad matches with open fingered gloves and punches from the clinch allowed had many mma fighters beating boxers in what was a hands only rule set. Mike Perry, Albert Tumenov, and Derek Campos being a few mma fighters who beat established boxers. I wouldn’t say mma has bad striking, I think that’s BS being said because of Jake Paul beating hand selected mma fighters who were older and past their time.
same with grappling. MMA is not where the best strikers and grapplers are, even if it should be, it's only the guys who decide to risk winning with whatever levels of skills you have.
In the mma gym i go to we do boxing sparring, kickboxing\muay thai sparring and we roll. We actually dont do mma sparring that often. I think that makes you better in striking than straight up just learning mma
I'm not sure how else to get in touch with you, so I thought I'd try here: I'm going to be in Vilnius for 10 days in June. I'd love a reference for a BJJ place where I could train while I'm there. Additionally, as a fan of your channel, I'd love to meet up sometime if that is possible.
No, MMA fighters don't "suck" at striking, they are just not "elite" as pure strikers. Usually, they can at least hold their own against pure strikers. McGregor did against Mayweather, Johnson did against Rodtang in the first "striking only" round, before demolishing him within seconds in the second "MMA" round. Artem "the GOAT" with 13-15 MMA Lobov won against former IBF and WBA champ Malignaggi in bare-knuckle boxing, Anderson Silva won against former WBC champ Julio César Chávez Jr. in pure boxing. MMA striking is not inferior to pure striking, it's just different. You have to consider the TD threat, thus your stance and movement have to be different, and you can't hide behind big gloves that will block most of the incoming big gloved punches. Boxing is sophisticated for boxing rules, kickboxing is sophisticated for kickboxing rules, MMA striking is sophisticated for MMA rules.
It is easier to close distance and clinch than to stay at the right distance and strike. This is an empirical fact. So grappling is the ultimate fighting style even outside the ring? This is the point if we are not talking about sports.
Agreed, but shouldn't the majority of MMA fighters have worse striking? Unless, that athlete came into the sport as a boxer; I'd assume they were grapplers in some sense (wrestling or ju jitsu which at the moment dominate the sport), so I would assume MMA fighters are good in the clinch, can wrestle, likely are dirty boxers because of the takedown threat. Only reason I like Adesanya is because he is kind of breaking up the mold with being a "striker" but with great takedown defense. I don't know if Icy would say Adesanya is a good striker though? Since he isn't a pure boxer.
If a highly skilled striker takes several months of grappling, or has a strong history of wrestling, he or she will dominate in MMA. Valentina Shevchenko and Israel Adesanya among many others show that. Wrestling is no longer a big secret. It had its day like BJJ. You have to know an adequate amount of those, and combined with high level striking makes a champion. Valentina said it took her like 4 months to learn enough grappling to win. She also said it took years to learn footwork and the creation of power in striking. Double leg, single leg, it’s not that hard to counter if that’s all they have. Jorge Masvidal showed what can happen to one of the best wrestlers in less then 5 seconds. The writing is on the wall. Learn some grappling, but your striking game must be on point in the future. Not hating. Just being real. Thanks for the video.
They suck at grappling as well. Not only does the inclusion of strikes when you're grappling and grappling when you're striking really change the dynamics of the game and leave you open to endless ways of attack, you also have to train both aspects of the sport to be decent at it. You can't just focus on one thing and expect to survive. And that which splits your focus will make you look like an amateur in the same aspect. It's the same as being a Jack of all trades vs a King of one. Guess which one survives MMA.
They do not. No striking is worth a dime if you can't stop a takedown attempt. MMA striking is the striking which WORKS. None of that bs kicking or Philly shell.
I agree that grappling is the primary trained skill set for MMA fighters, boxing is the secondary and kicking is the tertiary. Many (not all) of the MMA athletes come from a wrestling or BJJ background. Later they take Muay Thai to learn just enough striking to get by. This is why so many of them have sloppy striking techniques, especially when it comes to kicking. Kicking takes years and years of training to develop the neuromuscular abilities, flexibility and strength necessary to perform accurate and hard-hitting kicks. Don't get me wrong; I am not saying they cannot kick, I am saying most have very sloppy kicks.
Exactly lol. I'm no striker yet i have cringed a few times with some wild strikes that are sometimes thrown on the UFC. And also many mediocre takedowns
The issue is the description you're saying their striking is bad,, bad has a very specific connotation. When really the truth is it's not bad, it's just not as good as someone who ONLY works striking and it never will be for the reasons you mentioned
Hey Rokas, about your "make Aikido functional" approach I just thought, have you ever tested it in armor? Or against someone wearing it? I would like to see it if possible. Peace
It's a great discussion but I have dedicated myself to Kickboxing for over a decade and I train/coach MMA/Bjj 5 times a week and there are some great points being made here but sooooo many factors were ignored when he gave his answer I respectfully disagree with mikey.
That is the reason i hope to see more mexicans in the MMA, i think that the approach o "body hits until it is knocked" of the mexican style is something that will enrich more the MMA and make it less boring.
A good example is Mayweather's famous Philly Shell. It works wonders in boxing, but would get him taken down with zero resistance in an MMA fight. It's not that they can "get away with it", so much as striking has to fundamentally change when grappling and kicking is on the table. Imagine boxers as formula 1 racers, and MMA fighters as rally cars. The F1 would smoke a rally car on a paved course, but the F1 can't can't even drive on a rally track.
I don't agree that MMA fighters suck at striking and my example of where I'm coming from is Rodtang Vs Demetrious Johnson. Rodtang is one of the best strikers on the planet. While DJ did decently against him, Rodtang walked him down and did fantastic. Now I know this will sound like I'm saying the opposite haha, but I just want to get across how incredible Rodtang is as a muay thai fighter. Round 1 of this fight was contested under muay thai rules and the fight was in a cage with 4oz MMA gloves. Rodtang boxed DJ in with insane pressure and battered him for most of the round. But here's the eye opener; round 2 was contested under MMA rules. Suddenly, this legendary striker, one of the best on the planet, didn't look like that at all. He fought off of the back foot, his range wasn't great, he was snatching at his counters. The second he had to think about other elements such as the grappling, he instantly didn't look like half as good of a striker. In MMA, you just don't have the luxury of LOOKING like a great striker, because a lot of what makes fighters great strikers doesn't apply. If you just look at a photograph from Canelo Alvarez, you can see how effortlessly someone could pick his lead leg in an MMA fight. If you put Canelo into a cage tomorrow, suddenly he doesn't look like that amazing boxer. His stance and range would be completely different because you CAN'T stand that way in an MMA fight. So I don't think it's necessarily out of an inability to strike at a high level. I think it's more of an inability to look like an incredible striker whilst maintaining the other defensive elements of mixed martial arts.
It depends on the field they are training and fighting .A good boxer would be survive a min in the mma cage using only boxing and the same can be said for mma fighters .Even on eof the best striker like Cornor can't do shit to May Weather in the ring .You can see that in the match between these two that May Weather could easily ended Cornor with no more than 5 rounds but instead he fight till 10 rounds to lengthen the duration of the match to entertain the crowds .It is first and foremost always about the field you are studying and competing in .I dare to say even mma elite fighter would be struggle if he fought against 3 or 5 strong and healthy strangers in the street but a well-trained soldier could kill them all. However ,that doesn't mean that soldier can easily knock out the mma fighter in the cage .
Great strikers can make better money outside of MMA, where grapplers can make more money in MMA than outside of it, generally speaking of course there are exemptions to the this .
Totaly agree, basicaly a well rounded fighter IS waaay better than a master at only one thing A master Boxer can get railed by a medíocre jiu-jitsu fighter under the right circunstânces and the other way around is Also true so It's better tô know a little of ALL
If a person is using grappling, even the treat of grappling, to land punches and knockouts, is that being bad at striking? or is that using your tools to land strikes? Why is feinting a strike to land another strike having good striking when feinting a takedown to land a strike is bad striking?!? A knockout is a knockout
By the same logic mma fighters suck at grappling. The truth is a complete fighter looks different and fighting works different than specialized rules allow. Someone playing chess looks like shit trying to bowl with a pawn. IT ISNT THE SAME SPORT, THEY DONT SUCK, IT ISNT THE SAME THING.
Well there's Israel adesanya, Stephen Thompson, also Anderson Silva this guy's are pure striker if you know how to distance and timing or depends on the fighter
You're talking about only UFC fighters not all suck at striking and mma is mixed martial arts where most of those guys learn partially like 10 martial arts it's like becoming a jack of all trades and a master of none
It depends on who youre watching, for example when I watched the Usman Burns fight i was surprised of people complimenting Usman's jab, dude had to be reminded of using it in the first place, can imagine something like that happening in boxing.
Yeah, until you've experienced it, it's hard to understand how an opponent being noticeably better in one area of the fight can be devastating. And more than that, someone who can flawlessly link their striking to takedowns and then to submissions has a huge advantage. Even Michael Bisping admitted that bad strikers would surprise him with strong shots to the head because they interplayed the threat of a takedown with striking.
Also grapplers are usually very explodive so they have really strong punches despite their poor technique for example look at robbie lawler, johny hendricks, dan henderson and tyron woodley
I think I do not understand what he means, I am no expert at all but I think Adesanya, Yan, Prime Silva, prime Mcgregor and Stephen Thompson have very good striking and that is just to name a few. Cedric Doumbe is also transitioning to MMA. So I think I am not understanding his point.
wrestling is overrated. I'm probably just saying that because I suck at it because i only wrestled one time when I was a freshman in high school (i won that match despite my opponent clearly being better than me technique wise) but that was long long ago and I only did it one time and never wrestled again because I had other priorities and I wouldn't stand a chance against young muscle packed wrestler as far as wrestling is concerned. But I still think wrestling is overrated because if someone knows enough wrestling to stuff opponents take downs good striking helps a lot. and despite lots of fights going to the ground fight starts on the feet. and shot to the liver can win you a fight just as easily as a take down.
I think this is mainly because another reason, they are bad strikers because it's far harder to have effective striking when everything is allowed. Examples being: Oh you are going to go into your boxing stance for maximum power in your punch? Guess I'll just easely kick your leg from underneath you Wow your muay Thai stance is good against kicks but I'll be able to till pick or hook your leg and tackle you no problem. Oh well I gues il stand in a position where its harder to kick me, I stay out of range, and it's harder to take me down, but now guess what? My punches are out of range, I can't transfer good amounts of power anymore and neither can I be as quick. That's the problem, the optimal boxing stance is optimal for one thing, boxing of course, and shit at everything else. And of course striking in mma is a whole another game than anything in boxing, tats why a mma fighter will likely lose in boxing and a boxer will get killed in mma
There are some amazing instances of striking in MMA but it seems that now that MMA is no longer about styles going against styles 90's style MMA has its own striking and its own cookie cutter striking training, which is mostly muay thai and some pure boxing. I've had coaches straight up tell me that MMA is muay thai plus BJJ. Is there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not. But if you're very serious about striking then MMA gym is probably not the place for you. People have different temperaments and skills and some people hate very close contact and others thrive on it. A lot of people are taking MMA for self-defense and manliness brownie points these days and I'm not sure if leg kicks are the most important thing for self-defense. As much as people laughed at TKD even twenty years ago I'm thinking that their kicks may be better for self-defense (against untrained opponents) than thai kicks in many cases. Not to mention kickboxing. The confusion comes from the competition which is all about very slowly tearing someone down or setting up openings for takedowns. In the heat of the moment kicking a bigger man in the leg may not do anything and after you've used that opportunity he may already be in your clinch (on the street). A kick is supposed to allow you to keep your distance and run away immediately after a devastating blow in the groin, head or midsection.
There's of course quite a few exceptions but I always thought that people have no idea how big the cap is between professional kickboxers and MMA fighters in terms of striking. I wonder why more Kickboxers and Muay Thai fighters aren't fighting MMA? Adesanya has had great success so you'd think more would be trying it. The striking skill level would skyrocket if a lot of Thai boxers started fighting in MMA
It's because they need to learn a whole new set of skills, and they can't fight the same way they did in kickboxing. Just look at Rodtang's recent fight with DJ. As soon as the MMA round started, Rodtang *instantly* switched to a different stance - one that would make him harder to take down. IIRC, Adesanya is an exception because he always intended to make the transition to MMA, and trained with that goal in mind.
@@TheRedHaze3 You're a fake expert spouting the obvious. I never said they would dominate the UFC, I said they would raise the striking level. There's already plenty of fighters in the UFC that have lost a lot of fights but still have a career. You don't have to win a title to have a career. They can also learn to grapple as Adesanya did, when Israel first mentioned he is going to try MMA I bet there were people saying exactly the same thing about him. MMA is better financially than kickboxing in a lot of cases too which is another reason it may be attractive. Popularity is another one.
@@GhostOfBr Another scripted NPC response. Can literally predict what replies are going to be, I love NPC world. Plenty would have more success than Damian Mai, Adesanya is 10 times more successful than Maia. Wrestlers are better grapplers than Jitsoids anyway, so many Ryan Hall type bums thinking they can just use Jits to win a world title only to get KO'd when everyone figures their obscure trick out
I can somewhat agree but strongly disagree on this one. This is like comparing a rugby player to American football and saying their tackles/tackedowns suck.... MMA striking comes with their own basic rules, principles and a case by case scenario on who you are fighting do to it being so vast on techniques. However they "suck" at striking when comparing basic form, balance, distance management, timing, sight ect on the feet do to obvious reasons. this is lacking some accuracy and should addressed
0:28 "meta MMA which doesn't have a lot to do with self-defence" What? When he says, "meta" he's talking about 'most efficient tactic available', right? Isn't MMA like THE best thing you can do for self defence other than, what...firearms training & carrying?
Not really imo. MMA is good for a lot of things, and can work well for self defense, but - well, take groundwork for example. Useful against a solitary, unarmed opponent - but say you have 2 opponents. Or your opponent has a knife. In comparison, look at karate - inferior grappling, and may lose in a real, street level 1 on 1 fight to MMA. But if you pull out a tonfa, or nunchaku, you can address a knife wielder on more even terms. And as a pretty striking oriented style, it has some good options for standing combat, which is more useful if you have to deal with multiple targets. Kickboxing and muay thai also fall into this latter category. "MMA" as a "fighting style" to me is meta MMA, which means great grappling, great groundwork, at the expense of less polished striking and a complete lack of weapons work. In fact, you mentioned MMA as the best choice outside of carrying a weapon such as a firearm. In respect that point - if you live somewhere firearms are unavailable, but you can carry a melee weapon of some sort, surely a fighting style that teaches weapons, like Kali or Karate/Kobudo is a better choice? A barehanded fighter usually loses to a skilled weapon user - if you know what you're doing, even a cane becomes an absolutely devastating weapon. So how can MMA, which largely disregards weapon work, be the "best" for self defence? It's a nuanced thing. I'd definitely say MMA's grappling and pressure testing is very good for self defense, but that lack of weapon work in particular makes me raise an eyebrow at "the best".
@@yeetlordentertainment3937 well I'm not concerned with multiple opponents same as I'm not concerned with fighting a pro because 1. I pick my fights. Fighting multiple people by myself is like fighting a pro bare-handed. The best option against someone with cauliflower-ears or a 1 vs many situation is just run (so I guess parkour's the best in this instance? xD), get a weapon or get more men to even the numbers. 2. If I can help it I never go out alone. Bars, taverns, pubs, concerts, going out to eat etc I'm always with around 4 or 5 other men. (If you say to that, "but what if you HAD to? In a corner situation?" I'd try my best at strategy/tactics. Those tactics being stay on my feet striking only until I know I've KO'd every man except 1. Like vsing a pro or a giant. I'd try & find out what the pro excelled at & do the opposite. Striker? Grapple him. Grappler? Strike him. Giant? I guess leg kicks, chop him down then try bring him to the ground since BJJ seem to be the Kings of Giant Killing.) In regards to weapons I live in a nanny-state so you're literally not even allowed to carry a pocket knife let alone sticks, nun-chucks, tonfa or a gun (& no, I'm not going to fake a limp so I can carry a walking-stick). If someone has a weapon, same thing I either run or find a make-shift weapon. (I only brought up weapons because the next best thing after hand-to-hand training is either having strength in numbers or a brain over brawn AKA tools, in this case weapons. & from what I know about history the best weapon atm is a gun. I wonder what the most common melee weapon would be if law permitted us to carry anything we wanted? Do ya reckon the practicality of having a decent knife will always out-weigh the advantage but cumbersome nature of having to carry any of the bigger weapons around? (Cool image thinking of a modern city with every man carrying a melee weapon :D)
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed you've definitely thought things through pretty well - and I'm very sorry you live in a nanny state like that. However... there is no law that says you can't carry a flashlight. Not only is the blinding light really useful if you catch someone in the eyes off guard, a heavy duty flashlight can be used as a short club - some of them are made with that in mind, but still TECHNICALLY don't defy the law. You also asked about the practicality of being able to carry a pocket knife, compared to more cumbersome but potentially more dangerous weapons. Personally - I'm a nunchaku guy, I like reach. Being able to pull a 2.5 foot weapon out of my pocket, deploy it instantly, and keep anybody from getting close, that's appealing to me. Full disclosure tho, they ARE difficult to learn - I enjoy this sort of thing, but for the average joe, spending hours upon hours practicing and getting hurt is probably not worth it. A pocket knife - I don't actually like that as a self defense weapon. High lethality, low reach, convenient to carry, sure - but it's hard to justify using a knife against someone barehanded, and hard to beat someone with, say, a baseball bat if you've only got a knife. If you DO "win", the other guy's very likely dying, and that sucks from a legal perspective.
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed personally, I think swords and batons would be common. Easy to use, varying levels of lethality - some spears and staff weapons would be popular too. Nunchaku would likely fall out of favor - concealable reach is less valuable when you don't need to conceal your weapon.
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed personally, in such a world, I'd rock a shaolin spade, 3 section staff, and/or maybe a good ol fashioned bo staff. All personal favourites, and if you don't care about concealability, they do their job just fine! Might go in for a blunted 2 hander tho, a lot of fun choices in an open carry melee world.
There’s a local golden gloves boxer that I met. He ending getting destroyed by a an average sized dude in a street. It was a one on one fight, I saw the whole thing. The guy grabbed him through him on the concrete and that was it. After the fight his friends are trying to get him up and I’m telling them to wait for the ambulance. His friends were like he’s an all-New England golden gloves fighter. He would have won in a fair fight, and I flat out told them it was a fair fight. Your boy got slammed by a smaller guy.
If only they had some activity to do where you just practice strikes. Without the fear of getting thrown around. Just letting you practice punching things ya know? Maybe then some people would get good. Mike likes to make comments just to sound contrarian. They don't "suck" at striking. If regional pros at MMA suck where does the scale go from there? Are they the best in the world at punching or kicking? No. Are they training to be the best at one thing? No. They fight. The only way for them to actually get better at striking would be to impose rules that allow them to focus on striking only. Which isn't accurate to a real fight and already exists. Good MMA fighters can definitely transition with some time to train for a new rule set.
Watching Khabib feint the take down and drop McGreggors guard was an eye opener. it never occured to me that a double leg is kind of like a jab in alot of situations.
Even more so; every single movement you make can be used as a feint (which is what I think you mean), the game is about stealing time as well as distance. For instance, if your leg kick is to be respected, that opens up the opportunity to use the beginning of that movement as a feint, the same can be said for anything within your arsenal.
you are absoluteley gonna pull back when kabib faints a takedown , its game over
TJ Dillashaw uses takedown threats in his main combos.
Khabib has better striking than Conor. He was outstriking and outpositioning him with footwork before he was even successful with a takedown. Khabibs boxing is better. Boxing allowed the wrestling in that fight not the other way around. MMA striking sucks because the fans and the lower level strikers are stupid and can only understand what they see when they see someone take their opponent down everything else they are blind to
@@kratowol6703 lmaooooo
If you take striking out of grappling you get slick amazing grappling but a lot of positions, techniques, transitions emerge that completely expose you to strikes. The grappling may be more sophisticated but it isn't necessarily better for fighting.
You take the grappling out striking and the level of refinement and technique in striking starts to become specialized the same way it does in grappling. It's more sophisticated striking but it's not grappling aware and therefore puts in you bad positions for takedowns.
That's kind of the point of MMA, there's a balance here where each discipline on their own is a bit exposed if let to marinate in its own juices too long. The style vs style attribute of Gracie Jiu Jitsu is what allowed them to construct such a streamlined art. BJJ/Submission Grappling has moved past Gracie Jiu Jitsu in terms of technique level for sure (if you are talking sport grappling) but it's becoming a sport. MMA took that philosophy of the Gracies and its evolved light years.
So from the Gracies you have the derived sport grappling which is probably slicker grappling then GJJ but less general purpose fighting and you have the derived fighting style of MMA which obviously combines with other martial arts to be a superior form of combat sport.
A lot of people like to diss the Gracies' but I think you'd have to say, their influence is unmistakable and they set in motion both sport submission grappling and MMA even though classic Gracie Jiu Jitsu probably wouldn't win either on its own anymore.
Bruce Lee was also a big name in developing Western MMA philosophy and Japan had Shooto which the Fight looked like modern amateur MMA fights years before the first UFC. So they are a big part of it but they weren't the first and I think a lot of people don't like the Gracie's is because a lot of them aren't humble.
@@killaben85 Shooto gets a little muddy because their pro wrestling influence and dodgy fights at times means some of those fights weren't necessarily fights, more "performances". Pancrase predates UFC as a mixed martial arts promotion, and the concept of martial artists competing against different styles predates the sport elements by hundreds if not thousands of years.
@@killaben85 The Gracie's were developing their style 60 years before Bruce Lee was doing Martial Arts.
There's no question that questions about 'what's the best style' have been asked in countries all over the world.
Bryan, your point is really crucial I think. If you look at BJJ, it's clear that it is becoming increasingly removed from MMA as well as realistic fighting (i.e. self-defense), with ever more complicated techniques (and an infinite amount of guards). In a way, the same happened with other sports like judo, karate and taekwondo when they became (Olympic) sports. And as you say, the same is also true for wrestling, where striking is not allowed. After being assaulted in my youth, my interest has always been self-defense, and I tend to look at martial arts through that lens.
People can say a lot about the Gracies, but they have always considered self-defense an essential part of BJJ, and competition-focused gyms (which is probably most BJJ gyms nowadays) have taken self-defense out of the curriculum. My GF competes in BJJ, and she often shows me techniques and I often think: "I would have punched you in the face twenty times already." People who train only BJJ no longer train against striking, so they're not as prepared for a punch to the face. For self-defense (and MMA) there is just no good reason to spend so much time on techniques that complicated and risky. But to beat a good grappler, your grappling needs to be increasingly refined. The same with boxing and kickboxing.
Then again, even though MMA is (in my opinion) still the best preparation for realistic self-defense, you'd need other skill sets as well. MMA does not prepare you to deal with multiple attackers and weapons, which are not uncommon in situations of violent assault. People train for different reasons; my girlfriend trains for BJJ competitions and not self-defense. She doesn't care about self-defense. MMA practitioners may also be more interested in competitions rather than self-defense scenarios. Perhaps the best thing is to cross train (go to different gyms that specialize in different arts, e.g. a judo, BJJ, boxing, kickboxing and muay thai gym) but who has that much time and money? We all need to prioritize I guess.
@@lordtains You and me definitely sound like minded. Yeah I was careful to refer to MMA as a combat sport because as you point out, there's a lot of real world fighting scenarios that don't involve single fighters, fighters being of the same size, fighters training to a physical peak on a certain date, a ref, a neutral and mostly safe fighting surface, the expectation of rules, etc, etc.
I still would think that a skilled MMA trained fighter would probably be in the best position to 'conduct combat' than just about anyone else but the obvious difference is that in a sport you can study your opponent and implement a game plan. Where as in a total riot I would think speed and just 'not stopping' would win out over '.... wait for him him to circle left has he retreats... wait for it, counter... wait, there it is...' type fighting.
And I totally hear your point about cross training everything. I for one have a family and a day job. So time is a premium. I like BJJ because of the resisting opponent aspect and because I have a bad knee that makes stand up fighting (kicking or judo throws) impossible. I think the main thing is just understanding that it's drifting into being a sport. It would certainly help me in a fight, but it isn't the golden ticket it once was.
But hey, at least it's not a soft as Karate, Kung Fu, Aikido, etc that have you punching air and countering against opponents who freeze and let you execute complicated techniques.
That's why I enjoy Rokus' channel. His journey has some similarities with mine (though he's actually fighting so he's well surpassed me for sure).
Totally agree with Icy Mike. The threat of the takedown can turn an opponent from an elite striker into an amateur. Khabib was very mediocre on the feet, but had plenty of success standing up with some of the most elite strikers in the UFC.
That's where I disagree. Khabib was an extremely good striker. Of course most his success came due to take down threat... But what Icy Mike and you do wrong is that you consider boxing etc the ultimate striking. Boxing, Muay Thai etc is perfect striking for their respective ruleset. Many things that are considered advanced striking don't necessarily translate to a real fight. Footwork, headmovement etc are very different when knees, takedowns etc are a possibility. If Mike Tyson, Floyd, Canelo etc would fight MMA, their striking would look very different, but they are not suddenly worse strikers.
We saw how DJ was keeping up with Muay Thai world champion. Many MMA fighters have outstanding striking, and even the ones that look sloppy like Khabib are great if you know what actually matters in striking. Truly bad strikers like Ben Askren are outliers at higher level
Nah , khabib head movement was extremely good. Go see how he was slipping punches from Dustin poirier who undoubtedly one of the greatest striker in UFC
@@thomass.4007 I think you’re a little confused, because you’re literally explaining my (and Mike’s) point perfectly. We are literally saying the same thing as you.
@@shahan1465 Because of the threat of his grappling. Khabib is the GOAT imo, but to imagine he could beat poirier, gaethje, conor, barboza etc in a strictly striking only match would be delusional. Khabib’s striking was excellent when the threat of the takedown was there, without the threat, his striking is mediocre.
@@253MC We do partly agree, the difference is that I don't think that Khabib is a mediocre striker. I think Khabib is a very solid striker (that gets even more dangerous due to the takedown threat.)
We judge strikers on what we see in Boxing etc. But many of the advanced moves that we see in boxing are not that efficient, if kicks, knees, takedowns etc are allowed.
So I disagree that many high level mma guys suck at striking and postulate, that Icy Mike and most ppl underestimate them, because they judge them from a wrong perspective.
One more example: with boxing gloves it's easier to block, which means I have to use impressive footwork and slick counters to land my punches. People see that and believe I'm a great striker. With small gloves, I don't have to use that footwork, because it's much easier to land hits. Audience watching thinks I'm an amateur because no fancy footwork, and we get hit by each other all the time seemingly without effort.
My point: Icy Mike and Fans misjudge MMA fighters, due to missing variables
Great points made in this video, and I remember a time when elite strikers ( pre UFC) assumed that their boxing combos, taekwondo kicks, or karate backfists were not only sufficient for competition and self protection, but the highest form for it ( depending upon their preferred style ). They were very dismissive towards grappling, and hence spent excessive time on superfluous movements only suited to the contest rings of their respective styles.
The reason for bad striking in MMA has to do with the hierarchy of skills.
Pure grappling beats pure striking, therefore it makes more sense for a fighter to work more on his grappling.
@Wildcard amen
in UFC. back in PRIDE it was a whole other story.
@Wildcard "Bad" may be a bit strong, where as "less proficient" would be more apt. We are still talking about fighter athletic males, that can make up the difference in brute force. Even untrained men with enough weight will get KOs more often than not. I actually like to use Women's MMA as an example because the penalty for poor technique seems higher. Rousey's ability to dominate in part came from being able to tank sub par strikes to get inside. I fully expected Holm to be 1st to hit her properly having a boxing/kickboxing background. With all that back muscle of Rousey, I still expected a head kick to put her down. Probably don't have to say much about Nunes wrecking her down the line.
Silva had a TMA background that included kick boxing before he moved to MMA.
Wrong. It has to do with more money being in striking.
@Big Simpin That's nonsense. The unified rules are biased towards strikers a lot more than grapplers.
Consider:
- Rounds. Every 5 minutes, you are stood back up. The striker can be taken down at minute 2 and then spend 3 minutes playing as defensively as he can and then the fight is stood back up for free.
- Gloves. It's easier and safer to throw hard punches with a glove than without a glove. Gloves also hinder grappling.
- The referee can stand people up or break a clinch if there's no action. But he doesn't put people down on the ground if there's lack of action in the standup.
- Scoring. Arguable and has changed over the years, but today and generally speaking, significant strikes beat takedowns. Case in point, Askar Askarov vs Kai Kara France.
Even the lack of knees on the ground is really not favoring grapples. If knees on the ground were allowed, who do you think would become more proficient with them - wrestlers or strikers? It would be wrestlers, who anyway spend more time on the ground. You notice how ground and pound is something wrestlers are good at? Allowing knees on the ground would be adding to the arsenal of the wrestlers. One of the greatest, wildest and most haphazard grappling-based MMA fighter - Masakazu Imanari - spent his career in an organization that allowed knees on the ground.
There are plenty of mix martial artist who come from a striking background, in fact there are and there have been many kick boxing legends competing in the sport since ever.
I think that what you said is true but very badly put.
The fact that MMA fighters have what appears to be bad striking, is because you're comparing it to other combat sport that focus on it.
MMA striking level is getting really high in MMA, it has its own footwork and angles, I give you a practical example.
You take a boxer and put him in the octagon, his stance is too wide and he is very exposed to leg kicks, his head movement is very dangerous cause he risks getting kicked in the face while lowering his head, his gloves are not there to cover him up so his defence would need some serious work. Does the boxer have a low level striking?
You put an MMA fighter in a ring and he will look like an amateur, wrong footwork, wrong movements and angles, his striking is not low level, it's designed to work in another rule set.
Yeah that's fair. Yet you can still see wild overhead strikes being thrown here and there, and like Mike said, they can get away with it. It's just that even if you are good at striking, you can't over commit to it.
@@jestfullgremblim8002 the thing is, even wild looping overhand shots have their place on mma, especially when you're combining it with a takedown. You fake a shot and you throw a really wide overhand and your opponent will be concentrated on his center line to defend the shot, in such a way that his peripheral vision won't reach far enough to spot a wide overhand coming from the side. So it really really depends
@@BernardoWLopes true, true! The game is just a different one compared to the other fighting sports
Thanks, so I didnt have to write all this.
The fact that the gloves are so small plus kicks and takedowns means you cant fight like a boxer or kick/muay thaiboxer.
You cant spam kicks, the punishment for getting kicked caught and taken down is not worth it.
Also, this guy Icey Mike aint even that good. Idk why so many takes his word as gospel.
I agree with this. Because with the threat of a grappling situation I don't invest much time in learning to duck and roll with boxing strikes because if I'm going to be ducking or going low I want to take the initiative with grappling before the other person. It's natural in a street fight to hold a person while striking anyways so the rolling and ducking becomes obsolete while being held. All my fights were a chaotic mess of grabbing and striking but not anything very advanced. The simple stuff always works best.
Grappling becomes a threat only because most MMA fighters don't have good footwork, except for the wrestlers. But wrestlers weren't trained formally in striking. Grapplers will never grapple effectively if you have good footwork circling around them and changing directions constantly. Grapplers have to close the distance first before they can clinch or attempt a takedown. Look at the last match between Holly Holmes and Ronda Rousey. Most of the time Ronda Rousey couldn't touch Holly Holmes cause Holly Holmes had very good footwork and was able to maintain a good distance.
I don't think you can say that footwork that disregards takedown threats but increases punching power is better footwork, it's a different trade off. It's like BJJ guys claiming they are awesome at grappling but falling apart when punches are introduced.
Roka as usual you and your guest commentator
are insightful. Thank for sharing your collective wisdom.
MMA fighters suck at striking from a kickboxing/muay thai/boxing POV. Grappling for mma is also different from greco/freestyle/sport BJJ/ no-gi/judo etc... Just like how many of the best in grappling port over to mma and get out grappled and beat up on the bottom in an MMA context, good kickboxers come over in MMA and get knocked out (Gokhan Saki).
Why? Because grappling and striking in an MMA context is different from grappling in BJJ or striking in glory rules kickboxing. If someone feints a takedown, and you react, you can get caught with a huge looping overhand which would never land in kickboxing or boxing. Is that shitty striking? No... it's a well set up shot using a takedown feint. It's striking for MMA.
Striking is really really hard. Skill wise, it feels like it's far more intuitive to get skilled at grappling than it is striking. Striking is something that is so simple yet so hard to master unless you start really young.
Pure grappling beats pure striking/boxing. That's true.
HOWEVER... A good boxer/striker with just basic knowledge about grappling/wrestling can easily beat a grappler. And that's because the boxer doesn't need to have a black belt in BJJ to defeat a grappler. He only needs to know just the basic about how to avoid to be taken down to the ground. If the fight goes to the ground the boxer is lost, but if the boxer maintains himself on his feet is the grappler who is gonna suffer alot.
You can say the exact same thing about a grappler with competent striking. You don't need to train pure boxing or kickboxing for 5 years, you just need decent enough striking to close the distance on the striker.
Almost like the best strategy in mixed martial arts is to mix martial arts or something.
That's true but we see that if you are good at wrestling, you can basically neutralize your opponent's wrestling and then simply beat them by your superior striking. Examples: petr yan, adesanya, robert whittaker, yoel romero, max holloway and so on
yah the future of mma is basically everyone is an elite grappler so striking will decide more
Roel romero is a wrestler
@@danielvalmala3486 Background-wise sure, but it's not how he fights.
Adesanya is better at distance control than wrestling. Jan pretty much showed that
Adesanya sucks on the ground, doesn't he?
YES ! He touched on The Meta, which has a Huge Impact. The Meta of Takedowns and Grappling is so dominant it really is a waste of time to be focusing on footwork and striking. Not understanding the meta gets you into a lot of trouble and I don't see a meta-shift coming in anytime soon since it's just so effective.
Allow face-stomps, grounded knees to the head and head kicks on grounded opponents and see the meta shift over night.
You are risking a takedown, having safety crawling on your ass towards the opponent if you don't get it is just plain weird. That should be a punishable moment in a striker vs grappler match, much like a wrestler can punish your lowkicks.
And no, it's not more dangerous than getting elbowed on the mouth 12 times until you finally sleep in ground and pound.
Also, before anyone mentions UFC1, cool, we get it. The game changed, now you ain't getting kimuras and armbars left and right by virtue of the enemy having never seen one and not knowing it's about to be match ending
@@unwaveringdiscipline5489 looks like someone doesn’t know about Pride FC 🤣
You introduce foot stomps,grounded knees,etc and guys like Khabib and other GnP specialists would murder strikers.
Well if people watched the early UFC's, they had more strikers than grapplers because most of the martial arts were about strikes. When Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and wrestling became the standard in MMA, grapplers were considered complete because the clinching and ground game. Also grapplers worked more on defending the strike than striking.
All the early UFC winners were grapplers. ALL of them except 3 because Royce had to withdraw and a backup guy who only had to fight the last match came in. This simply isnt true. BJJ and wrestling WERE IMMEDIATELY the standard exposing all the garbage strip mall karate dojos with self promoted black belts.
this is why ilia is one of my favorites. i think he’s all around good at everything. striking and ground game
The other things to keep in mind are (1) training time and (2) what is the *actual overall* empirical performance of primarily MMA fighters in striking-only pro bouts.
Regarding the first factor, it certainly is a strain for any MMA fighter to get anywhere near as much striking training in as a competitor in only a striking-only sport.
Nevertheless, last I saw a compilation of MMA pro fighters' overall record in pro boxing, I was surprised to find--too-little discussed!--that the combined records had the MMA fighters ... batting right around .500 in win-loss ratio. When pro MMA fighters crossing over represent "an average pro" among pro boxers? That's not too shabby. :)
Striking for MMA is its own discipline. A wider stance is needed to defend the takedown, smaller gloves offer less protection from the high guard, and the threat of kicks/knees make low bobs and weaves a risky endeavour. Not to mention the fact that your opponent can also feint takedowns, or use feints to setup takedowns. I would argue that MMA fighters do not suck at striking, they excel at striking for MMA.
True but then you have guys like Petr Yan who is able to mix boxing type of striking flawlessly in MMA. I think MMA striking is evolving as well
I think MMA striking needs to stop being compared to boxing, kickboxing or muy thai. These are all diffetent sports anf striking in MMA is its own thing. The most common striking arts are in a smaller ring giving less area to move around in this impacts striking alot. I dont think striking is bad in MMA its just a styke optomized for defense in other areas that all other martial arts font have to worry about so its seen as "bad"
A big problem with a lot of MMA fighters striking is their footwork, too many fighters back up in straight lines. Reason for this is because a lot of MMA gyms from what I've seen spar on open mats instead of in a cage so they don't develop the proper cage craft. I can count on one hand the amount of MMA fighters that are good at striking going forwards and backwards
Head mouvement too ..
Why aren't you a pro then?
I think it changes the approach knowing if you whiff an attack you could end up on the floor eating elbows.
Icy mike sassy but knowledgeable as always 😆
😄😄
That guy sucks. He's far from an expert. Go watch his backyard fights. Rokas might be able to beat him.
@@kommisar. been following Icy Mike for a long time :) he's a damn good striking coach and a fun person....also sassy and knowledgeable, nobody said he was the ultimate fight expert ✌️
@@tomo2807 Have you actually watched his own fights? You can't tell me he's knowledgeable when he is so terrible. He's got a YT channel and a school. How does that make him an expert?
@@kommisar. don't like arguing in the comment section but sure let's go:
Yes I watched all of them, because I used to watch street beefs a lot as at the time it was valuable for me to look into what mostly normal people look like when they fight and used it as a learning tool, when Mike fought over there he showed pretty rudimentary and basic stuff...so how is it possible for me to call him knowledgeable if he in your terms "sucks". It's actually a very simple fact which is:
Fighter and a fighting coach are two different things.
A good coach can epistemologically understand the field of martial arts and fighting on a high level and in depth without them being able to perform in practice what they understand in theory, they teach others (like Cliff) who then carry the fruit of the coaches labour. How many great UFC coaches have you actually seen fight in the UFC? Regardless, if you want to perform a credibility check on someone, you shouldn't focus on the person, you should focus on the Data, in this case it's what Mike says that is either right or wrong, not how he performs,
here's an example of what I mean: he acknowledges the importance of grappling while he openly admits and showcases that he's not good at it...
that's understanding the theory vs the practice, hence as I says he's sassy and knowledgeable
Nobody ever said he was an insane world elite level fighter who's never wrong, you simply stated that he sucks and I disagree, all in all this is fun and I don't want to piss you off ✌️
It also comes down to what base you coming into MMA.
I think this is a fundementally flawed take. That they have to adjust to the threat of the takedown doesn't make the striking "suck", it just makes it a different ballgame. It's like saying kickboxers suck at striking because they have to utilize different footwork from traditional boxing or something. That being said ofcourse if you have to split your time so the striking might not be as good as someone who trains solely striking but that doesn't mean it's bad and it's a different type of striking due to the fundamentally different nature of striking with the threat of takedowns.
I agree quite a bit with this☝🏻
Exactly
The thing comes with them making fundamental mistakes when it comes to striking that are still viable with the threat of grappling.
I think you misunderstood the statement. Many people within the sport agree that MMA striking is inferior to high level boxing, kickboxing, muay Thai, etc. There are so many fighters who are gifted outside of striking that they get by without excelling at it. Damian Maia, Josh Koscheck, and Ryan Hall have all competed at a high level with mediocre at best striking. They are absolute demons on the ground but they never got to where high level strikers exist. The main thing that helps them with their striking is that they can threaten the takedown which creates interesting scenarios like when Khabib knocked down Conor.
If we are talking punches and kicks, you can spot the difference in technique between those that started in traditional MA, and MMA. Boxers are genuinely superior punchers, and further offset by conditioning for getting hit by other boxers. MMA guys don't have to be as proficient punchers among themselves, but average slobs that only know haymakers still have "success" too. Moving up the chain among men, you're just reducing the reliance on brute force with better technique through training. That said, I've watched a woman tank a haymaker from a stocky guy and basically go on to out box him, so he resorted to a double leg. He still ate a couple up kicks before running off. That was just 2 people in the street. I think women's MMA needs disproportionately better technique than Men's for knock outs. Rousey could just walk through shots until a proper striker put hands on her.
Main Takeaway: The threat of takedowns and grappling/wrestling make striking pretty effective even though it's kinda sloppy.
Boxers who’ve trained in MMA and sprawling, would demolish mfs. Mfs can try and shoot for a take down and one punch be out
That's a pretty fair assessment. I think it leaves a little out but, I'll focus on this aspect. The over-focus on grappling has made MMA practitioners lose respect for proficient striking. Askren vs. Paul is a good example. Askren was the kind of fighter who ate shots in order to get to the takedown. How are you going to take someone down when their right hook puts you to sleep?
On the street fighting / self-defense front, a dude once tried to single-leg me after failing to KO me with a sucker punch. I dropped my weight (e.g. sat on my punches), grabbed his hair, and "hockey punched" him until he stopped fighting back. By the end, my right hand was split open between the 3rd and 4th knuckle and responding officers thought I'd used a weapon until witnesses came forward to corroborate my claim of self-defense. The fight was ruled mutual combat because neither of us pressed charges. Side point, this is why you might want to consider conditioning your knuckles outside of gloves and wraps. My skin split open, but I didn't break my hand and that's somewhat important.
Love this!
I feel like loosening the rules about kicking the head of a "grounded" opponent in MMA would shift the balance a lot more. Going to the ground is immediately a much greater risk when going for a takedown can easily get you kicked or kneed in the head if you mistime it. I guess full-on stomping would genuinely be too dangerous to allow, but I don't really think axe kicks or "soccer kicks" to the head of a downed or kneeling opponent are significantly more dangerous than kicks to head while standing TBH. Probably the second most frivolous "safety" ban after the 12-6 elbow.
Until someone gets injuried and people start calling for banning MMA again. The only safety rule it is wrong tight now is 12-6 elbow. In the end the sport needs its rule to have legimacy.
Which martial art can beat any martial art ?
This the same guy that says oblique kicks won’t work in a fight?
short, sweet and icyyyyyy
(the sweet one is Rokas)
i think striking for MMA requires it's own specific timing and since MMA fighter train that specific timing for that specific discipline therefore good seasoned MMA fighter has a great timing under that specific ruleset, more often than that his timing would be better than that of boxer of kickboxer as he knows where and when fit that in and how to set it up for MMA and when is safe to do so. does that mean that they can compete and win under kickboxing or boxing ruleset with boxer or kickboxer? no, not at all(well maybe 1 out of 10 times), but under MMA rules yes very much so
There are a lot of mma fighters who’s striking is elite. It’s elite for mma. Like everyone is saying, grappling changes everything. Rodtang’s striking game was way different in round 1 compared to round 2 when he fought Demetrious in the mist Thai/ mma fight
In my utmost humble opinion.
“ No rules without exception”
Within all fields, there will always be outliers, that stated, when it comes to fighting in general, making absolutes and or generalizations/ blanket statements is usually not as clear cut, nor “And or”.
We’ve seen top level mma athletes perform impeccably not only within their respective field, as we’ve also seen examples of practitioners( though they might be outliers ) but still, they are able to be competitive against the specialists within their own fields as well, and they perform undoubtedly pristinely when one takes into consideration that they are willingly stepping into another sport yielding to, and accepting said disadvantages( ie Boxing/ Bare knuckle/ Muay Thai/ kickboxing) And they are not only competitive, but in some occasions they are actually able to win.
( The most recent example I can think of is Demetrius Johnson vs Rodtang) As well as Anderson’s Silva’s recent boxing match, just to mention a few.
Max Holloway is also one to take note of, his fight against Cattar was akin to observing death disguised in elegance, his performance would make any “ Pure” striker bow in acknowledging of what they were observing, he performed with such excellence, he moved and adapted with such impeccable timing that not only was he able to put on an clinic, but despite the threats of all the wrestling, he displayed ( At least in my opinion) One of the highest levels of striking that one can aspire to attain in an mixed martial arts setting where the grappling is an constant threat, and he still managed to nullify that, dominate and defined the proverb:
“Timing is the essence of everything”
It was truly beautiful to watch, such pristine technique, so again, I think mr Firaz Zahabi states it appropriately:
“ There are levels to this game”
I can see where Mike is coming from, and I can agree up to an certain point, but the fighters/ athletes are adapting and developing themselves in an unprecedented fashion, and they will only continue to further improve and become better as the sport continues to grow.
Sincere regards.
Fellow Martial Artist.
Tom Framnes.
Norway.
I think that you do have a fair point, but overall, MMA fighters indeed have not so good striking
Anderson Silva isn't really a good example, because he isn't a "MMA striker". He started in TMA and transitioned to MMA after being in kickboxing. Silva came in to MMA a better striker than most.
I used the Rodtang Vs DJ example in my response as well. While Rodtang definitely did look leagues above DJ as a striker (despite DJ doing nicely at times), Rodtang suddenly became half the striker he was when you introduced the other elements in round 2. It's not so much people completing in MMA fights can't strike, it's more so the combination of elements make it hard to look like an elite striker. Rodtang going from an incredible pressure muay thai fighter, capable of mixing in every single element of his striking game, to snatching at counters off the back foot and having bad control of his range all in the space of one minute just highlights that it's very hard to look like an elite striker in MMA, but it doesn't mean you're not one.
Been saying this forever thank you mike lol
Do they though ? (I know the title is intentionally provocative)
But I think it's unfair to say they suck at striking. The striking in MMA is adapted to the ruleset.
It's like saying they suck at Wrestling or BJJ, or anything because they are just not specialized and maybe couldn't equal champions of those disciplines... If you train for MMA you logically train what you need to win at this specific game, nothing less, nothing more.
MMA is not Muay Thai+BJJ+Wrestling. It's a sport of its own, with its own skillsets, tactics and strategies. Yes it overlaps with other sports but that's all.
It is like saying water polo players suck at swimming because they are not as fast and they are often using their hand for other thing than swimming.
Like reciving the ball and throw it.
Calling them bad strikers dosen't make justice
@@katokianimation exactly!
Great vid guys👍
Thanks!
This is why I’m wanting to be the best striker and be a master at grappling defense. I’m really wanting to actually use striking as a form of takedown defense, but I’ll learn that soon enough
and you will be 10 times more entertaining to watch fight
@@ChazSeamus28
I wanna be the type of guy who defends a takedown with a knee or uppercut and make it work. Definitely gotta fully understand grappling defense to do it tho lol
I’m glad the common man isn’t as aware of using underhooks overhooks sprawls and head hands defense as they are at blocking dodging and throwing strikes. It would make life much harder for us wrestlers lol. I think all it is, is centuries of people ignoring wrestling and it’s come back to bite a lot of these people in the ass.
Comparing mma striking to boxing and muay thai is comparing apples and pears. They are completely different as they cater to the ruleset that they are used for.
A good striker in mma won't fight like a muay thai fighter with a tall stance, and as for boxing in the pocket, it can be snuffed out immediately by engaging in a clinch.
Id argue good strikers that want purely striking for mma looks more like a karate distance management style of fighting. (Wonderboy, mcgregor etc).
The issue is that you are watching ring sports with no threat of takedown to indicate what good striking looks like.
the mma vs boxing mixed rules triad matches with open fingered gloves and punches from the clinch allowed had many mma fighters beating boxers in what was a hands only rule set. Mike Perry, Albert Tumenov, and Derek Campos being a few mma fighters who beat established boxers. I wouldn’t say mma has bad striking, I think that’s BS being said because of Jake Paul beating hand selected mma fighters who were older and past their time.
same with grappling. MMA is not where the best strikers and grapplers are, even if it should be, it's only the guys who decide to risk winning with whatever levels of skills you have.
In the mma gym i go to we do boxing sparring, kickboxing\muay thai sparring and we roll. We actually dont do mma sparring that often. I think that makes you better in striking than straight up just learning mma
Well aren’t you supposed to get good at mma in mma?
I was wondering what would be the best way to take a punch to the face with out a mouth guard if one should have to take a punch to the face.
I'm not sure how else to get in touch with you, so I thought I'd try here: I'm going to be in Vilnius for 10 days in June. I'd love a reference for a BJJ place where I could train while I'm there. Additionally, as a fan of your channel, I'd love to meet up sometime if that is possible.
No, MMA fighters don't "suck" at striking, they are just not "elite" as pure strikers. Usually, they can at least hold their own against pure strikers. McGregor did against Mayweather, Johnson did against Rodtang in the first "striking only" round, before demolishing him within seconds in the second "MMA" round. Artem "the GOAT" with 13-15 MMA Lobov won against former IBF and WBA champ Malignaggi in bare-knuckle boxing, Anderson Silva won against former WBC champ Julio César Chávez Jr. in pure boxing.
MMA striking is not inferior to pure striking, it's just different. You have to consider the TD threat, thus your stance and movement have to be different, and you can't hide behind big gloves that will block most of the incoming big gloved punches. Boxing is sophisticated for boxing rules, kickboxing is sophisticated for kickboxing rules, MMA striking is sophisticated for MMA rules.
tai chi: no are you challenging me
no touch jutsu: you guys do strikes?
It is easier to close distance and clinch than to stay at the right distance and strike. This is an empirical fact. So grappling is the ultimate fighting style even outside the ring? This is the point if we are not talking about sports.
Agreed, but shouldn't the majority of MMA fighters have worse striking? Unless, that athlete came into the sport as a boxer; I'd assume they were grapplers in some sense (wrestling or ju jitsu which at the moment dominate the sport), so I would assume MMA fighters are good in the clinch, can wrestle, likely are dirty boxers because of the takedown threat. Only reason I like Adesanya is because he is kind of breaking up the mold with being a "striker" but with great takedown defense. I don't know if Icy would say Adesanya is a good striker though? Since he isn't a pure boxer.
If a highly skilled striker takes several months of grappling, or has a strong history of wrestling, he or she will dominate in MMA. Valentina Shevchenko and Israel Adesanya among many others show that. Wrestling is no longer a big secret. It had its day like BJJ. You have to know an adequate amount of those, and combined with high level striking makes a champion. Valentina said it took her like 4 months to learn enough grappling to win. She also said it took years to learn footwork and the creation of power in striking. Double leg, single leg, it’s not that hard to counter if that’s all they have. Jorge Masvidal showed what can happen to one of the best wrestlers in less then 5 seconds. The writing is on the wall. Learn some grappling, but your striking game must be on point in the future. Not hating. Just being real. Thanks for the video.
They suck at grappling as well.
Not only does the inclusion of strikes when you're grappling and grappling when you're striking really change the dynamics of the game and leave you open to endless ways of attack, you also have to train both aspects of the sport to be decent at it.
You can't just focus on one thing and expect to survive. And that which splits your focus will make you look like an amateur in the same aspect.
It's the same as being a Jack of all trades vs a King of one. Guess which one survives MMA.
They do not. No striking is worth a dime if you can't stop a takedown attempt. MMA striking is the striking which WORKS. None of that bs kicking or Philly shell.
Adesanya? Jon Jones? McGregor? Tony Ferguson? Anderson Silva?
Fighting shouldn't look nice, it must be effective, fighting is just destroying your opponent.
Because the rule set mostly make BJJ and grappling the win condition.
I agree that grappling is the primary trained skill set for MMA fighters, boxing is the secondary and kicking is the tertiary. Many (not all) of the MMA athletes come from a wrestling or BJJ background. Later they take Muay Thai to learn just enough striking to get by. This is why so many of them have sloppy striking techniques, especially when it comes to kicking. Kicking takes years and years of training to develop the neuromuscular abilities, flexibility and strength necessary to perform accurate and hard-hitting kicks. Don't get me wrong; I am not saying they cannot kick, I am saying most have very sloppy kicks.
Exactly lol. I'm no striker yet i have cringed a few times with some wild strikes that are sometimes thrown on the UFC. And also many mediocre takedowns
@@masters8536 yeah, you're pretty much right. Unless you already are awesome in a given style and then decide to get into MMA
The issue is the description you're saying their striking is bad,, bad has a very specific connotation. When really the truth is it's not bad, it's just not as good as someone who ONLY works striking and it never will be for the reasons you mentioned
Hey Rokas, about your "make Aikido functional" approach I just thought, have you ever tested it in armor? Or against someone wearing it?
I would like to see it if possible.
Peace
Rokas: "I agree with you! Now please tell me why because I don't know. "
It's a great discussion but I have dedicated myself to Kickboxing for over a decade and I train/coach MMA/Bjj 5 times a week and there are some great points being made here but sooooo many factors were ignored when he gave his answer I respectfully disagree with mikey.
Watch Rodtang vs DJ perfect example of a high level striker vs high level mma fighter and how grappling significantly changes the fight
That is the reason i hope to see more mexicans in the MMA, i think that the approach o "body hits until it is knocked" of the mexican style is something that will enrich more the MMA and make it less boring.
A good example is Mayweather's famous Philly Shell. It works wonders in boxing, but would get him taken down with zero resistance in an MMA fight. It's not that they can "get away with it", so much as striking has to fundamentally change when grappling and kicking is on the table. Imagine boxers as formula 1 racers, and MMA fighters as rally cars. The F1 would smoke a rally car on a paved course, but the F1 can't can't even drive on a rally track.
nothing but facts
Mma guys have better grappling than striking because grappling drills/ sparring is less painful and less likely to devolve to gym beefs.
I don't agree that MMA fighters suck at striking and my example of where I'm coming from is Rodtang Vs Demetrious Johnson. Rodtang is one of the best strikers on the planet. While DJ did decently against him, Rodtang walked him down and did fantastic. Now I know this will sound like I'm saying the opposite haha, but I just want to get across how incredible Rodtang is as a muay thai fighter. Round 1 of this fight was contested under muay thai rules and the fight was in a cage with 4oz MMA gloves. Rodtang boxed DJ in with insane pressure and battered him for most of the round. But here's the eye opener; round 2 was contested under MMA rules. Suddenly, this legendary striker, one of the best on the planet, didn't look like that at all. He fought off of the back foot, his range wasn't great, he was snatching at his counters. The second he had to think about other elements such as the grappling, he instantly didn't look like half as good of a striker. In MMA, you just don't have the luxury of LOOKING like a great striker, because a lot of what makes fighters great strikers doesn't apply. If you just look at a photograph from Canelo Alvarez, you can see how effortlessly someone could pick his lead leg in an MMA fight. If you put Canelo into a cage tomorrow, suddenly he doesn't look like that amazing boxer. His stance and range would be completely different because you CAN'T stand that way in an MMA fight. So I don't think it's necessarily out of an inability to strike at a high level. I think it's more of an inability to look like an incredible striker whilst maintaining the other defensive elements of mixed martial arts.
That's because boxing and MMA aren't the same thing. It's like saying Tom Brady sucks at playing 3rd base. So what?
Basically his point.
I think Rodtang vs. Demetrious Johnson could prove that (MMA Fighters Suck at Striking) wrong.
It depends on the field they are training and fighting .A good boxer would be survive a min in the mma cage using only boxing and the same can be said for mma fighters .Even on eof the best striker like Cornor can't do shit to May Weather in the ring .You can see that in the match between these two that May Weather could easily ended Cornor with no more than 5 rounds but instead he fight till 10 rounds to lengthen the duration of the match to entertain the crowds .It is first and foremost always about the field you are studying and competing in .I dare to say even mma elite fighter would be struggle if he fought against 3 or 5 strong and healthy strangers in the street but a well-trained soldier could kill them all. However ,that doesn't mean that soldier can easily knock out the mma fighter in the cage .
Great strikers can make better money outside of MMA, where grapplers can make more money in MMA than outside of it, generally speaking of course there are exemptions to the this .
The only money as a grappler outside of MMA, is WWE.
Someone else finally gets it.. Thank you sir.
Totaly agree, basicaly a well rounded fighter IS waaay better than a master at only one thing
A master Boxer can get railed by a medíocre jiu-jitsu fighter under the right circunstânces and the other way around is Also true so It's better tô know a little of ALL
If a person is using grappling, even the treat of grappling, to land punches and knockouts, is that being bad at striking? or is that using your tools to land strikes? Why is feinting a strike to land another strike having good striking when feinting a takedown to land a strike is bad striking?!? A knockout is a knockout
Jack of all trades, master of bone
By the same logic mma fighters suck at grappling. The truth is a complete fighter looks different and fighting works different than specialized rules allow. Someone playing chess looks like shit trying to bowl with a pawn. IT ISNT THE SAME SPORT, THEY DONT SUCK, IT ISNT THE SAME THING.
We are used to seeing good boxing, but bad boxing doesn't mean bad striking in MMA. If the striking yields result, then it's good striking.
Because they are Grappler not a Striker but there still strikers Out there in MMA.
Well there's Israel adesanya, Stephen Thompson, also Anderson Silva this guy's are pure striker if you know how to distance and timing or depends on the fighter
Mighty mouse vs rodtang and anderson silva’s boxing. Connor didnt look that bad too against the best boxer in the world.
You're talking about only UFC fighters not all suck at striking and mma is mixed martial arts where most of those guys learn partially like 10 martial arts it's like becoming a jack of all trades and a master of none
Wow....two amateurs talking about how MMA fighters suck at striking. Don't you love the internet?
The opposite Is also true. Mythological strikers could adapt poorly to MMA. Take Saki vs Roundtree as an example
Honestly since about 4 or 5 years ago they've gotten a lot better with their hands and feet. Especially in the boxing department
If you can one to someone and light them up with it you don't even need to worry about them doing anything else
It depends on who youre watching, for example when I watched the Usman Burns fight i was surprised of people complimenting Usman's jab, dude had to be reminded of using it in the first place, can imagine something like that happening in boxing.
Bad striking? It's called real fighting perfect technique is for point fighting and demonstrations still good click bait!
Yeah, until you've experienced it, it's hard to understand how an opponent being noticeably better in one area of the fight can be devastating. And more than that, someone who can flawlessly link their striking to takedowns and then to submissions has a huge advantage. Even Michael Bisping admitted that bad strikers would surprise him with strong shots to the head because they interplayed the threat of a takedown with striking.
Also grapplers are usually very explodive so they have really strong punches despite their poor technique for example look at robbie lawler, johny hendricks, dan henderson and tyron woodley
I think I do not understand what he means, I am no expert at all but I think Adesanya, Yan, Prime Silva, prime Mcgregor and Stephen Thompson have very good striking and that is just to name a few. Cedric Doumbe is also transitioning to MMA. So I think I am not understanding his point.
Check "Clear Tai Chi" for some solid self defense based Tai Chi Xuan... they can fight for real.
I thought it was an April fools based on the title and the date. 😜
😄
wrestling is overrated. I'm probably just saying that because I suck at it because i only wrestled one time when I was a freshman in high school (i won that match despite my opponent clearly being better than me technique wise) but that was long long ago and I only did it one time and never wrestled again because I had other priorities and I wouldn't stand a chance against young muscle packed wrestler as far as wrestling is concerned. But I still think wrestling is overrated because if someone knows enough wrestling to stuff opponents take downs good striking helps a lot. and despite lots of fights going to the ground fight starts on the feet. and shot to the liver can win you a fight just as easily as a take down.
I think this is mainly because another reason, they are bad strikers because it's far harder to have effective striking when everything is allowed. Examples being:
Oh you are going to go into your boxing stance for maximum power in your punch? Guess I'll just easely kick your leg from underneath you
Wow your muay Thai stance is good against kicks but I'll be able to till pick or hook your leg and tackle you no problem.
Oh well I gues il stand in a position where its harder to kick me, I stay out of range, and it's harder to take me down, but now guess what? My punches are out of range, I can't transfer good amounts of power anymore and neither can I be as quick.
That's the problem, the optimal boxing stance is optimal for one thing, boxing of course, and shit at everything else. And of course striking in mma is a whole another game than anything in boxing, tats why a mma fighter will likely lose in boxing and a boxer will get killed in mma
There are some amazing instances of striking in MMA but it seems that now that MMA is no longer about styles going against styles 90's style MMA has its own striking and its own cookie cutter striking training, which is mostly muay thai and some pure boxing. I've had coaches straight up tell me that MMA is muay thai plus BJJ.
Is there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not. But if you're very serious about striking then MMA gym is probably not the place for you. People have different temperaments and skills and some people hate very close contact and others thrive on it.
A lot of people are taking MMA for self-defense and manliness brownie points these days and I'm not sure if leg kicks are the most important thing for self-defense. As much as people laughed at TKD even twenty years ago I'm thinking that their kicks may be better for self-defense (against untrained opponents) than thai kicks in many cases. Not to mention kickboxing. The confusion comes from the competition which is all about very slowly tearing someone down or setting up openings for takedowns. In the heat of the moment kicking a bigger man in the leg may not do anything and after you've used that opportunity he may already be in your clinch (on the street). A kick is supposed to allow you to keep your distance and run away immediately after a devastating blow in the groin, head or midsection.
So leg kicks only hurt in the ring? Please go train before you say such stupid shit.
There's of course quite a few exceptions but I always thought that people have no idea how big the cap is between professional kickboxers and MMA fighters in terms of striking. I wonder why more Kickboxers and Muay Thai fighters aren't fighting MMA? Adesanya has had great success so you'd think more would be trying it. The striking skill level would skyrocket if a lot of Thai boxers started fighting in MMA
It's because they need to learn a whole new set of skills, and they can't fight the same way they did in kickboxing.
Just look at Rodtang's recent fight with DJ. As soon as the MMA round started, Rodtang *instantly* switched to a different stance - one that would make him harder to take down.
IIRC, Adesanya is an exception because he always intended to make the transition to MMA, and trained with that goal in mind.
Well, because they would struggle a lot against a Demian Maia who can take them down and make them remain there throughout the round.
@@TheRedHaze3 You're a fake expert spouting the obvious. I never said they would dominate the UFC, I said they would raise the striking level. There's already plenty of fighters in the UFC that have lost a lot of fights but still have a career. You don't have to win a title to have a career. They can also learn to grapple as Adesanya did, when Israel first mentioned he is going to try MMA I bet there were people saying exactly the same thing about him. MMA is better financially than kickboxing in a lot of cases too which is another reason it may be attractive. Popularity is another one.
@@GhostOfBr Another scripted NPC response. Can literally predict what replies are going to be, I love NPC world. Plenty would have more success than Damian Mai, Adesanya is 10 times more successful than Maia. Wrestlers are better grapplers than Jitsoids anyway, so many Ryan Hall type bums thinking they can just use Jits to win a world title only to get KO'd when everyone figures their obscure trick out
Cedric Doumbe is actually getting into MMA , will be interesting to see how far he goes
But I also like grappling too I am working on both like George St. Pierre
I think that's a picture of Stevie Ray, Scottish MMA fighter, who is definitely a good striker.
Cursed png file distributors :/ When I was downloading the png from a library it said nothing about the fighter 😅
@@MartialArtsJourney Excellent video as always. The stuff with Icy Mike is 🔥
I can somewhat agree but strongly disagree on this one.
This is like comparing a rugby player to American football and saying their tackles/tackedowns suck....
MMA striking comes with their own basic rules, principles and a case by case scenario on who you are fighting do to it being so vast on techniques.
However they "suck" at striking when comparing basic form, balance, distance management, timing, sight ect on the feet do to obvious reasons.
this is lacking some accuracy and should addressed
0:28 "meta MMA which doesn't have a lot to do with self-defence"
What? When he says, "meta" he's talking about 'most efficient tactic available', right? Isn't MMA like THE best thing you can do for self defence other than, what...firearms training & carrying?
Not really imo. MMA is good for a lot of things, and can work well for self defense, but - well, take groundwork for example. Useful against a solitary, unarmed opponent - but say you have 2 opponents. Or your opponent has a knife. In comparison, look at karate - inferior grappling, and may lose in a real, street level 1 on 1 fight to MMA. But if you pull out a tonfa, or nunchaku, you can address a knife wielder on more even terms. And as a pretty striking oriented style, it has some good options for standing combat, which is more useful if you have to deal with multiple targets. Kickboxing and muay thai also fall into this latter category. "MMA" as a "fighting style" to me is meta MMA, which means great grappling, great groundwork, at the expense of less polished striking and a complete lack of weapons work.
In fact, you mentioned MMA as the best choice outside of carrying a weapon such as a firearm. In respect that point - if you live somewhere firearms are unavailable, but you can carry a melee weapon of some sort, surely a fighting style that teaches weapons, like Kali or Karate/Kobudo is a better choice? A barehanded fighter usually loses to a skilled weapon user - if you know what you're doing, even a cane becomes an absolutely devastating weapon. So how can MMA, which largely disregards weapon work, be the "best" for self defence?
It's a nuanced thing. I'd definitely say MMA's grappling and pressure testing is very good for self defense, but that lack of weapon work in particular makes me raise an eyebrow at "the best".
@@yeetlordentertainment3937 well I'm not concerned with multiple opponents same as I'm not concerned with fighting a pro because 1. I pick my fights. Fighting multiple people by myself is like fighting a pro bare-handed. The best option against someone with cauliflower-ears or a 1 vs many situation is just run (so I guess parkour's the best in this instance? xD), get a weapon or get more men to even the numbers. 2. If I can help it I never go out alone. Bars, taverns, pubs, concerts, going out to eat etc I'm always with around 4 or 5 other men.
(If you say to that, "but what if you HAD to? In a corner situation?" I'd try my best at strategy/tactics. Those tactics being stay on my feet striking only until I know I've KO'd every man except 1. Like vsing a pro or a giant. I'd try & find out what the pro excelled at & do the opposite. Striker? Grapple him. Grappler? Strike him. Giant? I guess leg kicks, chop him down then try bring him to the ground since BJJ seem to be the Kings of Giant Killing.)
In regards to weapons I live in a nanny-state so you're literally not even allowed to carry a pocket knife let alone sticks, nun-chucks, tonfa or a gun (& no, I'm not going to fake a limp so I can carry a walking-stick). If someone has a weapon, same thing I either run or find a make-shift weapon. (I only brought up weapons because the next best thing after hand-to-hand training is either having strength in numbers or a brain over brawn AKA tools, in this case weapons. & from what I know about history the best weapon atm is a gun.
I wonder what the most common melee weapon would be if law permitted us to carry anything we wanted? Do ya reckon the practicality of having a decent knife will always out-weigh the advantage but cumbersome nature of having to carry any of the bigger weapons around? (Cool image thinking of a modern city with every man carrying a melee weapon :D)
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed you've definitely thought things through pretty well - and I'm very sorry you live in a nanny state like that. However... there is no law that says you can't carry a flashlight. Not only is the blinding light really useful if you catch someone in the eyes off guard, a heavy duty flashlight can be used as a short club - some of them are made with that in mind, but still TECHNICALLY don't defy the law.
You also asked about the practicality of being able to carry a pocket knife, compared to more cumbersome but potentially more dangerous weapons. Personally - I'm a nunchaku guy, I like reach. Being able to pull a 2.5 foot weapon out of my pocket, deploy it instantly, and keep anybody from getting close, that's appealing to me. Full disclosure tho, they ARE difficult to learn - I enjoy this sort of thing, but for the average joe, spending hours upon hours practicing and getting hurt is probably not worth it. A pocket knife - I don't actually like that as a self defense weapon. High lethality, low reach, convenient to carry, sure - but it's hard to justify using a knife against someone barehanded, and hard to beat someone with, say, a baseball bat if you've only got a knife. If you DO "win", the other guy's very likely dying, and that sucks from a legal perspective.
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed personally, I think swords and batons would be common. Easy to use, varying levels of lethality - some spears and staff weapons would be popular too. Nunchaku would likely fall out of favor - concealable reach is less valuable when you don't need to conceal your weapon.
@@BootsofBlindingSpeed personally, in such a world, I'd rock a shaolin spade, 3 section staff, and/or maybe a good ol fashioned bo staff. All personal favourites, and if you don't care about concealability, they do their job just fine! Might go in for a blunted 2 hander tho, a lot of fun choices in an open carry melee world.
There are muay thai fighters from thailand who compete in ONE Championship. Look up Dejdamrong.
There’s a local golden gloves boxer that I met. He ending getting destroyed by a an average sized dude in a street. It was a one on one fight, I saw the whole thing. The guy grabbed him through him on the concrete and that was it.
After the fight his friends are trying to get him up and I’m telling them to wait for the ambulance.
His friends were like he’s an all-New England golden gloves fighter. He would have won in a fair fight, and I flat out told them it was a fair fight.
Your boy got slammed by a smaller guy.
If only they had some activity to do where you just practice strikes. Without the fear of getting thrown around. Just letting you practice punching things ya know? Maybe then some people would get good.
Mike likes to make comments just to sound contrarian. They don't "suck" at striking. If regional pros at MMA suck where does the scale go from there? Are they the best in the world at punching or kicking? No. Are they training to be the best at one thing? No. They fight.
The only way for them to actually get better at striking would be to impose rules that allow them to focus on striking only. Which isn't accurate to a real fight and already exists. Good MMA fighters can definitely transition with some time to train for a new rule set.
It's interesting how he seperates mma fighters from violent criminals