In Defense of Tyron Woodley's Tentative Performance

Unlimited rounds, keep going until the stoppage! Woo!

Lay n pray would still exist of course, but it would also have to lead to something eventually! Yeah!!

Woodley vs Mein = not winning from the bottom

Cancer makes scientists think creatively too

Death to Lay and Pray!

But it is satisfying when a prolific lnp exponent gets blast

I agree with this. The reality, in that fight, is that Woodley has really good top control, does not take a lot of chances in order to advance position and is active enough to prevent a stand-up. I also think he out-muscled Mein, and the latter just couldn’t do much because of the lack of openings and the lack of pure strength to shuck him off.

Jordan Mein knew exactly what Woodley was gonna do. Why not plan accordingly?

it really looked their plan was if you get taken down, play for a stand up or throw elbows.

the level of the average MMA fighter’s game of his back is pretty limited it seems these days. They look use the guard to: A. create space and scramble away or B. lock down and try to get get a stand up.

There’s grinding and there’s complete lack of doing anything but holding someone down which is what Woodley was doing the majority of the time.

This is a TV/entertainment driven sport and allowing that sort of performance on a high profile card will surely only hurt the expansion / mythical ‘mainstream acceptance’ of MMA?

I was against lay n pray from top control for a long time, but my stance has changed. As of late, I have been frustrated with the fighter with the fighter on the bottom for not trying to get back to his feet. While Woodley did utilize lay n pray, Mein didn’t even fight for an underhook to try and scramble back up, push on his head and hip escape, attempt to get butterfly guard or do other tactics to try to get back to his feet. We are at a point in MMA where judges favor top control, yet there are still fighters who just don’t attempt to get back to their feet when they are on the bottom. They really should know better by now especially when facing a wrestler. I know that it’s easier said than done, but there are things that Mein could have done (like getting underhooks) even with Woodley going chest to chest and lying on him.
Don’t get me wrong here because Woodley was utilizing wrestling to lay n pray and do stalling tactics, but Mein could have done more on the bottom especially with him knowing that he was going up against a wrestler.

Knees to the head I can get behind.

I agree with this (and kicks), not necessarily because it would give wrestlers something to think about when shooting (though that’s a pleasant side effect), but because I can’t think of a good reason why they should be illegal. I simply can’t imagine that a knee or kick to a stationary, grounded opponent is more dangerous than a knee or kick to a standing opponent who is stepping into it. I’d love to see somebody rig up a test dummy with accelerometers and find out for sure.

Less weight to top control?

I’d rather see more weight on escapes. I think if nothing else happened in a round except fighter A getting a takedown and fighter B escaping before taking any damage, that round should be a tie. Takedowns are a means, not an end. If you don’t do anything with it, it shouldn’t be worth any points.

a handfull of Blue Diamond chocolate almonds

Please, you need to get yourself some Wasabi & Soy Sauce Almonds. Those things are amazing.

but isn’t the guard considered an neutral position? If that is the case, then enforcement of this rule and then the guard is a position where the advantage goes to the fighter who is more active, aggressive or doing more damage.

To me implementing this view of things changes the guard as a position in MMA. Fighters on top either need pass or be aggressive inside the guard to win, while bottom fighters have a path to victory.

Get rid of stand ups all together to encourage bottom fighter activity and legalize knees on the ground and up kicks and the ground game in MMA looks totally different.

On the point of aggressive stand-ups: no. The idea that a fight should be stood up simply because nothing is happening is ridiculous and as we’ve seen before, aggressive stand ups allow fighters on bottom to simply hold on for dear life in order to force a stand-up. It allows fighters to be lazy.

So why is having more action a bad idea exactly? If a top fighter is neutralized in advancement and striking, the guard fighter has done his job. Would a ref allow 2 1/2 minutes of clinch in a boxing match? Hell no.

Oh how I love the meteoric rise of Johny Hendricks. Here is a wrestler who could lay and pray with the best of them but instead he comes out and deposits their head on the roof of the building. It seems that he is the antidote to go lay and pray wrestler. Unfortunately not every fighter is like him, possessing a combination of knock out power and superior wrestling skills. Someone like Tyrone Woodley is a very one dimensional type of fighter and it painfully shows. Yes, he can beat a lot of fighters with his style but does that mean you should get the opportunity to? And that is where I have issues. I do not think Woodley should fight for a belt until he shows that he can win fights in a variety of ways, simply for the sake of the sport. if you want to see someone become motivated to advance their ground skills let them know that they cannot just lay and pray their way to victory and expect to get a title shot, that should fix things right quick.

I know grounded knees will never happen. The commissions immediately veto the idea as soon as the topic comes up without any discussion. They did a big survey a few years ago of a bunch of fighters, trainers and managers about adding “Pride rules” and the vast majority were against it, mostly because it would require an entirely different philosophy and dramatic change in training.

On the “less weight to top control” aspect, really, there’s no “weight” to it in the rules. People just assume the guy on top is winning and score it that way. Plus, broken record alert, I feel the TD has way too much power in the rules for a simple forced change of position.

Tyron is really good at one thing: taking you down and holding you there. It’s a little ridiculous to expect Mein to suddenly get as good at defending take downs as Tyron is at getting you down. It’s even more ridiculous when the rules favor the wrestler and limit his opponents methods of defending the take down.

I agree with Castillo on just about all points. My memories of the fight are that both men were about equally responsible for the inactivity on the ground. Mein was just playing for a stand up the majority time he was on his back which means all of his efforts were focused on tying up Woodly and limiting his ability to strike from guard. Once you get the stand up because you were able to stall your opponent in your guard you better be able to make something happen on the feet because you are acknowledging your unwillingness to generate offense on the ground. Both men know that this type of performance wont get them anywhwere with the fans or Zuffa so I think the marketplace will sort this out on it’s own. Guys know they wont stay on a broadcast if this type of inactivity happens again so they will either change or make room for fighters who are willing to be busy everywhere the fight goes.

He should have been warned, and if he continued to stall and not engage in the fight he should have had a point taken away. Same thing goes for pulling a Ben Saunders on the bottom, same thing goes with pulling a Kalib Starnes on the feet.

Knees to the head are an awesome idea. They reward wrestlers who pass guard, but punish wrestlers who go for sloppy take downs. It will force wrestlers to become better stand up fighters to better set up their shots, and help a guy like GSP who passes guard but has trouble finishing inflict some violence. Paul Daley would have probably knocked out T-Wood in his last fight if he could have hit him with a knee, because Woodley was so tired he was in very vulnerable positions but was technically safe because he was a in three point stance.

That said Mein should have had better tdd. Let’s not act like he was Miguel Torres or Nate Diaz off his back or anything.

Would you rather be 15-15 and known as crazily exciting or go 30-0 and be in the record books for one of the longest undefeated streaks in MMA history?

Who got paid? The guys who bet on Woodley, or the guys who bet on Mein?

Who got their win bonus?

I mean, I am not saying the fight was good…I’m not saying I enjoyed watching it. But not every fight is going to be great or even good.

Woodley is a wrestler who is taking the path of least resistance to win…there are PLENTY of great wrestlers in his division, he’ll fight one eventually, and either lose, or have to fight differently to win….