BREAKING NOW: The Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/ A. Silva Striking Style Puzzle Solved. Capoeira!

Before you read this post please review these Youtube Videos on Capoeira (just in case the Hyperlink does not work here is the short version of the url courtesy of Google's url shortener http://goo.gl/m769N) .

Also please skim over this Google Book (http://goo.gl/azcdc)

Capoeira: Roots of the Dance-Fight-Game

Nester Capoeira

I have practiced Capoeira since High School. I discovered it while researching African-Brazilian customs, slavery, etc.

While attempting to show a student (who I have been teaching take down defense and balance) a regular leg sweep, I switched it up by placing my hand on the floor, as an achor and THEN spining to deliver a capoeira style leg sweep.

I meant to surprise her or to take her off guard to truly test her balance. I then decided to show her how capoeira players play (see videos) or "dance around" to deliver their strikes. I also began to punch (traditional boxing style, no spinning to deliver the blow) as I played. Then it struck this reminds of me of .....Frankie Edgar, Dominick Cruz, Anthony Pettis, and Anderson Silva (Yellow Rope).

See. Anderson Silva Receives His Yellow Rope in Capoeira - Nate Thomas - Bloody Elbow - 01/05/10  

 However, I think their style draws a little from capoeira AND Boxing. Capo Kickboxing or Capoeira adopted for MMA.

Nester Capoeira's words - "The Dance-Fight-Game".

I will now define it.

Noun. a style of of stand-up striking....

Verb (what it does or its function)

 that incorporates the dancing (circular) footwork of capoeira, with the traditional (non spining to deliver a blow) upright striking stances of kickboxing (K-1 style and boxing); also combines the best aspect of angle changes from the parent arts. For takedowns, it incorporates traditional wrestling or judo (which use the hands and not the feet) as opposed to spinning leg sweeps.

Also spins are exhanged for lateral movement; flamboyant spinning kicks traded for kicks delivered while upright. 

Also a math formula:

Capoeira Dancing + (any strike from muay thai, boxing, kenpo, wing chun, sanshou, etc.) = Capoeira Adapted for MMA 

It is an improvement over Capoeira for 4 main reasons ( 4 main weaknesses in terms of MMA):   

Capoeira Weakness 1:

Capoeira dancers turn their backs to opponents while spinning (vulnerable for a window of time) to kick and are not use to someone coming in and taking them down by grabbing their legs or taking their back for a rear-naked-choke.

Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva corrections:

Edgar/Cruz/Silva use lateral/diagonal movement (no spins, no turning the back to your opponent) and cut in towards a opponent and use a traditional strikes. Pettis is unorthodox or the exception.

Capoeira Weakness 2:

Caoeira players leave their hands out and to the side for balance. While spinning to deliver a kick they may place their hand on the ground to increase the power of their kicks.

This leaves their chin wide open and can be tagged by traditional punches. Also, MMA is close-quarter,  hand to hand combat. Capoeira fighters are NOT used to someone grabbing them in a Thai Clinch.

Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva corrections:

They keep their hands in a traditional boxing stance. This guards their chin and face, allows them to deliver traditional boxing blows, and to hand fight (guard against throws, dirty box, and guard against, or apply the Thai clinch).

Capoeira Weakness 3

Capoeira Stylist use only leg sweeps to take down an opponent.  They are mostly acomplished by surprise, deception of intention (spinning away as if to run away only to revolve around to move forward and strike), changing angles, and most importantly the feet or sweeps (although you could dance, then center your opponent and surprise him with a Muay Thai forward kick, Tik (sp) Kick I believe) .

Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva Corrections:

They are free to use their hands to shoot in and use traditional wrestling techniques and even judo techniques.

Capoeira Weakness 4:

Capoeira players may need wide, or significant space to pull off spinning roundhouse kicks (capoeira style) or spinning axe kicks.

Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva Corrections:

Once again, MMA is close quarter and they have eliminated spins.

Keys to Victory:

If you are a traditional capoeira fighter looking to get into MMA, don't be prideful or feel you are not representing your culture if you vary your style as I describe above - research all of the pure capoeira artists who lost (See. Youtube link above) in MMA matches and learn from their mistake.

Also, some other observations about their style (capoeira/kickboxing):

Capoeira is built for lightweights:

The dancing requires a huge reserve of cardio. In other words it is a high energy stance and better suited for the 155 lb. and below fighters.

I think boxing is a energy conserving stance built for the heavier weights. Most of the changing of angles comes from moving the upper body at angles (back, forth, side to side) with the feet firmly planted.

Also, Capoeira players also "tag" in and out because of the high energy demands, while boxers, even heavyweights, can go for 12 rounds if necessary.

Key to Victory:

To defeat Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva I would advise you bring in some high-level, fast, and pure capoeira players to spar with - they are the only ones who can imitate the style of Edgar/Cruz/Pettis/Silva. 

Thanks to everyone who ever gave me a positive comment on my articles. I have decided to start my own blog and various micro blogs on topics such as religion, movie and music reviews, interviews with MMA fighter (audio version), etc. I also want to trail blaze satire in MMA writing.

Special thanks to Jonathan Snowden - you are a big inspiration.

I study about P.T. Barnum alot so with that said - 

Thank you for coming to my circus and paying the price of admission (thoughtful comments)!

MMA: No Heels (fabricated villains created by ++E creative teams or bookers) Required

Also three questions, to the blog's staff, that may help other fan posters?

1. SB Nation Blogs are connected - is there anyway to syndicate the fanpost (post it all at once on all of the blogs in a sub genre (example MMA)?

When I try to cross post to other SB Nation Blogs, I get a message saying I am posting too much.

2. Can someone write a tutorial on fanposting guidelines and how to use the fanpost editor.

3. Also, I think the authors of fanposts should be able enable/disable comments on their fanpost and comments from certain members of the community. Also create their own whitelist for each fanpost.

It would take the strain off the main administrator. Imagine if each author had the same authority over his blog post as he does over his twitter account or facebook page - with the ultimate authority being the blog administrator of course. Does such a software exists? 

God Bless You.

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