Now that Jon Jones has captured the light heavyweight title (as correctly predicted by your friends at this blog), he has, in the eyes of fans and the media, ascended to the status of godhood -- that rarefied air occupied only by other figures of worship such as Anderson Silva and GSP.
Well, this blog ain't buyin' it! Jon Jones is very good, but he's not invincible. Like the aforementioned MMA gods Silva and GSP, Jones benefits from being in a division where few other fighters possess the strengths to exploit Jones' weaknesses. Silva, for instance, has been able to hold his title for so long because of a dearth of excellent wrestlers in his division. The one time he had to face a great wrestler, that wrestler, Chael Sonnen, pounded Silva's face into the Octagon for 23 minutes before succumbing to one of his two major weaknesses -- a submission -- the other being an inability to stay out of trouble with the government. (Sonnen would be in real trouble if he ever had to fight a bureaucrat who knew submissions!) Other than Sonnen, Silva has benefited from facing a parade of inferior strikers and grapplers lacking sufficient wrestling ability to exploit Silva's glaring weakness in this area. Meanwhile, the sickening goody-two-shoes Canadian GSP benefits from occupying a division lacking a powerful, fast striker with good wrestling. (The Shertards will have a heart attack when I say this, but a bulked-up Frankie Edgar could take out GSP.)
As for Jones, he, too, benefits from having possibly the strongest wrestling in his division, possessing the GSP-like ability to take down wrestlers with more credentials. However, when and if Jones faces a wrestler who can stuff his takedowns and capitalize on Jones' penchant for silly spinning kicks and elbows, he will lose.
Alas, I do not believe Rashad Evans will be this wrestler, though I can see how he could win if he trained right and employed the proper game plan. (This is highly unlikely given Evans' limited intelligence in these matters.) The wrestlers Jones previously defeated were unprepared for Jones' superior ability because they made the mistake of thinking, "I have X number of wrestling credentials, so there's no way this junior-college wrestler is going to take me down." Evans, at least, won't make that mistake. If Evans trains right (again, highly unlikely), then he is fast enough to take down Jones during one of Jones' flashy ballerina attacks and is a good enough wrestler to hold him down. Also, Evans is fast enough to get in and out with his powerful punches in order to negate Jones' reach. (Why not train as Roy Nelson did for Struve -- with training partners standing on chairs and wielding long pipes? I'm only half kidding here!) The problem, however, is that Evans, though displaying a strong chin in his earlier fights, has, upon being punched, performed the turkey-leg dance in his past three fights. Such a suspect chin does not bode well for Evans in this fight and will probably cause his demise.
A short review of the dreaded Sherdog forums -- abandon hope, all ye who enter -- illustrates the consensus reaction to Jones' win --a combination of shock that Jones decimated Pride-nerd hero Shogun, a premature desire to coronate Jones the new undisputed king of MMA, and a disillusioned acceptance that there's no longer any use in watching MMA since Jon Jones will, after gutting the light-heavyweight division, buzz saw through the heavyweight division and then presumably trounce even Goku of Dragon Ball Z and perhaps, finally, Chuck Norris himself.
Though clearly a great fighter, Jones is not the invincible beast he is being worshiped/feared/hated as. One strong piece of evidence in favor of this assertion is that idiotic Sherdog Radio host TJ Desantis spent nearly the entire Beatdown After the Bell disgustingly burning incense at the altar of Jones. Desantis, like Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, is an excellent negative indicator. Everything he says turns out wrong, but Desantis over the years has perfected his authoritative radio voice so that his inane predictions have the ring of truth -- much the way Bernanke masks the absurdity of his catastrophically wrongheaded economic prognostications in the veil of incomprehensible econometric babble. Ergo, we can safely assume that since TJ has anointed him, Jones will inevitably disappoint.
An early sign of that disappointment revealed itself in the title fight -- the fact that despite taking no significant damage and in fact dominating his opponent, Jones was badly gassed by the end of the first round and won only because Shogun was even more gassed as a result of Jones' offense. Jones' trainer blames the gassing on all of the media attention Jones has received of late and, laughably, his alleged superhero act in subduing a New Jersey crackhead. (I have me doubts about whether that incident was not heavily overblown for UFC propaganda purposes.)
Me thinks Jones did not train very hard for this fight, and he didn't have to since his superior wrestling would have enabled him to squash the wrestling-deficient Shogun even if he hadn't trained at all. But Jones has gassed in his previous UFC bouts that went the distance. This gassing will catch up with him sooner or later, and all the alleged experts will, in shock and amazement, ponder what happened to their latest figure of worship.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Shogun vs. Jon Jones Prediction
Shogun is a great fighter, known for ravaging opponents in a hurricane of aggression, twice besting the supposedly unbeatable Machida (once unofficially and once unequivocally). Because of his smashing of Machida and a few others, Shogun has gained somewhat of a Couture-esque reputation for overcoming impossible odds.
He will need every bit of this Couture-esque ability in his first title defense and his most monumental fighting test -- a battle with the seemingly invincible Jon Jones. Like Super Mario after picking up a bouncing star icon, Jones has chainsawed through the lower echelons of the light-heavyweight division, crushing durable but mediocre also-ran competition such as Brandon Vera and Vladimir Matyushenko. Though many idiotic MMA pundits gave Vera and Matyushenko a chance, it should have surprised no one that Jones obliterated these two perrenial jobbers-to-the-stars. What should have garnered notice was the ease with which Jones dispatched Vera, literally shattering his face, with icicle-sharp elbows. Vera is a mediocre fighter at best, but he usually survives the duration of the fight and takes little damage on the route to his typical decision loss. That Jones would have none of Vera's general awkwardness and fight-stalling tactics illustrates Jones' special ability to expertly execute any maneuver and fight plan he chooses.
What makes Jones special is not his much-heralded 2000-inch wingspan or his towering height (after all, if these were the primary attributes of fighting success, the heavyweight title would always be around the waist of Hong-man Choi). What makes Jones a future champion is his ability to execute. When he wants to do something, he pulls it off -- whether it's a takedown, a spinning back elbow, etc.
This ability to execute -- especially the ability to shoot for successful, crushing takedowns from far away -- will cause immense difficulties for any fighter, Shogun included.
Shogun, therefore, must nullify Jones' ability to execute. To do so, Shogun must aggressively press the action, walking through Jones' octopus-style, multi-limbed offense and swarming the praying-mantis-like fighter with punches, kicks, and takedown attempts. This blitzkrieg strategy will rip Jones out of his comfort zone and trap him in a situation he has never experienced -- a real fight. Transported from his typical state of total control to one of survival, Jones might forget strategy and leave himself open for a patent-pended sloppy Shogun knockout punch. In other words, Shogun must employ the same strategy Sonnen did against Silva -- enter the tornado of offense and impose your will anyway, not waiting for an opportunity but making it.
Can Shogun pull off such a strategy? He has a chance because thus far, despite all the hype about Jones' supposedly incredible striking skills, he has yet to knock out anyone in the UFC and, in the stand-up, has significantly hurt only one UFC opponent -- Heath Herring slayer and otherwise terrible jobber to the stars Jake O' Brien. This does not mean that Jones cannot KO or TKO Shogun, but given that Shogun's chin is relatively sturdy, Shogun has a chance to beat Jones by walking through Jones' flurry of flashy kung-fu-film maneuvers and hurting the monstrous beanpole. Another reason for the presumed success of such a strategy for Shogun is that Jones, overconfident in his ginormous reach, often fails to keep his hands up -- a failure that exposed earlier Shogun victim Chuck Liddell to inevitable doom.
However, even if Shogun can walk through the whips for arms and legs attached to Jones, he must contend with the true reason Jones has won most of his recent fights -- his explosive, powerful wrestling ability. Shogun is an expert grappler, but Jones will take him down. The question is whether Shogun will be strong enough to nullify or even submit Jones on the ground. Given that Shogun has been easily taken down by much lesser wrestlers, I think the answer is no.
Therefore, though I'd love to see Shogun pull a Couture, I think instead we'll see the Sting-Vader (American Bash 92) scenario of the up-and-coming monster sawing in half the veteran with a cruise-missile takedown and showering a rapid succession of stalactite elbows onto the cranium of a trapped and shocked Shogun in route to a TKO victory.
Prediction: Jon Jones, TKO, Round Two
He will need every bit of this Couture-esque ability in his first title defense and his most monumental fighting test -- a battle with the seemingly invincible Jon Jones. Like Super Mario after picking up a bouncing star icon, Jones has chainsawed through the lower echelons of the light-heavyweight division, crushing durable but mediocre also-ran competition such as Brandon Vera and Vladimir Matyushenko. Though many idiotic MMA pundits gave Vera and Matyushenko a chance, it should have surprised no one that Jones obliterated these two perrenial jobbers-to-the-stars. What should have garnered notice was the ease with which Jones dispatched Vera, literally shattering his face, with icicle-sharp elbows. Vera is a mediocre fighter at best, but he usually survives the duration of the fight and takes little damage on the route to his typical decision loss. That Jones would have none of Vera's general awkwardness and fight-stalling tactics illustrates Jones' special ability to expertly execute any maneuver and fight plan he chooses.
What makes Jones special is not his much-heralded 2000-inch wingspan or his towering height (after all, if these were the primary attributes of fighting success, the heavyweight title would always be around the waist of Hong-man Choi). What makes Jones a future champion is his ability to execute. When he wants to do something, he pulls it off -- whether it's a takedown, a spinning back elbow, etc.
This ability to execute -- especially the ability to shoot for successful, crushing takedowns from far away -- will cause immense difficulties for any fighter, Shogun included.
Shogun, therefore, must nullify Jones' ability to execute. To do so, Shogun must aggressively press the action, walking through Jones' octopus-style, multi-limbed offense and swarming the praying-mantis-like fighter with punches, kicks, and takedown attempts. This blitzkrieg strategy will rip Jones out of his comfort zone and trap him in a situation he has never experienced -- a real fight. Transported from his typical state of total control to one of survival, Jones might forget strategy and leave himself open for a patent-pended sloppy Shogun knockout punch. In other words, Shogun must employ the same strategy Sonnen did against Silva -- enter the tornado of offense and impose your will anyway, not waiting for an opportunity but making it.
Can Shogun pull off such a strategy? He has a chance because thus far, despite all the hype about Jones' supposedly incredible striking skills, he has yet to knock out anyone in the UFC and, in the stand-up, has significantly hurt only one UFC opponent -- Heath Herring slayer and otherwise terrible jobber to the stars Jake O' Brien. This does not mean that Jones cannot KO or TKO Shogun, but given that Shogun's chin is relatively sturdy, Shogun has a chance to beat Jones by walking through Jones' flurry of flashy kung-fu-film maneuvers and hurting the monstrous beanpole. Another reason for the presumed success of such a strategy for Shogun is that Jones, overconfident in his ginormous reach, often fails to keep his hands up -- a failure that exposed earlier Shogun victim Chuck Liddell to inevitable doom.
However, even if Shogun can walk through the whips for arms and legs attached to Jones, he must contend with the true reason Jones has won most of his recent fights -- his explosive, powerful wrestling ability. Shogun is an expert grappler, but Jones will take him down. The question is whether Shogun will be strong enough to nullify or even submit Jones on the ground. Given that Shogun has been easily taken down by much lesser wrestlers, I think the answer is no.
Therefore, though I'd love to see Shogun pull a Couture, I think instead we'll see the Sting-Vader (American Bash 92) scenario of the up-and-coming monster sawing in half the veteran with a cruise-missile takedown and showering a rapid succession of stalactite elbows onto the cranium of a trapped and shocked Shogun in route to a TKO victory.
Prediction: Jon Jones, TKO, Round Two
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