http://www.insidefighting.com/betwee....aspx?uid=3534“The Shovel and the Epee”: Striking in Boxing and MMA - 4/10/2007
by Sam Sheridan
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As Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) skyrockets in popularity, the resistance of mainstream media outlets (Sports Illustrated and ESPN) has historically probably been due to a fear of pro-wrestling combined with old-school boxing writers lack of understanding. Boxing writers love boxing; and they often feel, correctly, that MMA fighters usually aren’t the best boxers.
They may not realize that the guy in there who is boxing so badly is an Olympic wrestler and submission expert—but strict boxing fans mentally “turn-off” the moment the fight hits the ground, and so are unable to appreciate the skill and art of ground-fighting. “Ground-and-pound” is a rough art. But MMA fans who “get” the ground game will take as much joy from a ground war as they will a stand-up one.
There is more to the debate, however—MMA striking is fundamentally different than boxing, for a variety of reasons. Over years of observing the sport, I kept noticing pro boxers making the switch to MMA and getting ‘out-struck.’ When Jens Pulver fought Takanori Gomi in 2004 in Pride, Jens had been winning pro boxing fights and knocking people out; I thought there was no way in hell Gomi could stand with him, but Jens was outgunned by a bigger man and lost by TKO.
Yosuke Nishijima, a former NABO Cruiserweight Champion with a pro boxing record of 24-2-1 went 0-4 in Pride, a top MMA organization. He went into the clinch with Evangelista “Cyborg” Santos and was throwing body shots while Cyborg threw knees—much heavier.
More recently, Drew Mcfedries with 5 MMA fights out-struck Alessio Sakara, who had won professional and amateur boxing titles in Italy. Drew is explosive and iron-chinned, but it was still an interesting result.
I recently had a long internet discussion with Carlo Rotella, a professor at Boston College who wrote “Cut Time,” a terrific book in which he established himself as one of the great thinkers and writers on boxing—I avidly pursued him with the intention of picking his brain. He isn’t an MMA fan, although he may be starting to come around. I tried to explain some of the differences that I noticed, and some of the reasons that pro boxers might get out-struck in MMA. The “stand-up” part of MMA isn’t boxing, or kick-boxing or Muay Thai—it’s its own thing.
First, the gloves: the 4 ounce gloves used in MMA cut very easily, and they give a lot more guys “a puncher’s chance.” Almost everyone is heavy-handed with those on, flash knock-downs happen all the time.
Just ask George St. Pierre—I doubt anyone had warned him about the devastatingly heavy-hands of Matt Serra before Serra upset St. Pierre by TKO last Saturday to win the UFC welterweight title. In boxing, a guy is a “puncher” or he’s not—but in MMA, almost everybody’s a “puncher.”
In boxing, defensive stylists like Winky Wright can catch punches on their gloves, but that won’t fly in MMA, not with the little gloves. Likewise James Toney’s defensive masterpieces, the shoulder roll and catching shots on the top of his head, won’t work.
Another friend, a boxer, had said that “boxers learn to roll with punches” which is true, and can mitigate a lot of the power when you get caught clean—but with the little gloves, I think rolling with punches is minimally effective. There’s not much to roll with.
The defensive techniques of masterful boxers like James Toney would have to be adjusted for MMA.
The more important difference between MMA and boxing is range, and the biggest modifier to range is the take-down. The biggest, most decisive single attack in MMA, the take-down and defending it are HUGELY important. You can’t stand in the pocket and shoulder-roll and bob and weave, because your opponent will drop (“change levels”) and take you down; and he’ll end up on top, a hugely advantageous position.
To avoid being taken down, you have to keep your distance and be ready to “sprawl” out, to keep your legs away from an opponent’s grasping hands. Beautiful, flowing, fluid combination punching leaves you in range to be taken down.
You can’t take a wide stance, or plant your feet without increasing the danger of your legs getting snatched out from under you. In fact, without boxing’s strict rules about the clinch, combination punching might never have evolved to the point it is at today.
Of course, kicking and kneeing also changes the range, and punching in MMA becomes a little more like jousting—you’ve got to come in with straight punches and get out. Chuck Liddell’s striking is pretty much unquestionably the best in MMA at 205 pounds, and boxers look at him and think he looks terrible. Floyd Mayweather recently commented during a media teleconference that “UFC ain't nothing but a f_king fad. Anybody can go out there and street fight. If they think (UFC light heavyweight champion) Chuck Liddell is so good, we should take Chuck Liddell and take a good heavyweight under Mayweather promotions….” And he even offered a million dollars of his own money. All the diatribe does is reveal Mayweather’s ignorance, because Chuck is emphatically not boxing.
I won’t pretend to understand Chuck’s striking, but some factors are an understanding of power and leverage, finding angles on his punches, taking excellent angles with his feet and body, and most importantly perhaps his accuracy and “pop.” He throws his winging shots, his looping punches, as hard as he can; and he’s a sniper.
He’s got a set of whiskers, he’s impossible to take down, and he comes with a barrage of hard accurate punches the moment he gets an opening. His form is loose and open because MMA striking is an open game.
Chuck is a good striker for MMA—he’s not the best striker in the world. But put Vitali Klitschko in there with a decent MMA heavyweight and see if he goes two minutes before he’s on his back being submitted.
Chuck’s a great striker, but he’s still an MMA fighter; put him in there with Floyd’s heavyweight and if he’s losing the stand-up he’ll take the boxer down and pound him out, or even (Heaven forbid) submit him.
There sometimes can be slowness to MMA striking match—the third Tim Sylvia vs. Andre Arlovski fight comes to mind, which was a very technical and interesting fight, despite the booing. First of all, you’ve got two heavyweights who have knocked each other out, so they’ve got to be careful.
In ‘old-time’ bare-fisted prize-fighting, fighters would throw 2-3 punches a minute, something that the modern 3-minute round system and gloves (in boxing) has completely changed . MMA, with the longer 5-minute round and the tiny gloves, has taken us a step back on that road.
The gloves are closer to bare-fisted, and cut much more readily. Mario Sperry, a legendary Brazilian fighter who trained under Carlson Gracie and founded Brazilian Top Team, reminisced to me about the old Vale Tudo (“anything goes” in Portuguese) fights without gloves, that they were “bloodbaths.” Sylvia and Arlovski played a very technical little game of range and motion, a game of fractions of an inch, for 5 five-minute rounds.
I’ve heard some trainers say that too much pure boxing is actually bad for MMA fighting—you get used to the close range, you get into the mentality that you can “take one to give one.”
When I raised these points with Professor Rotella, he responded, “that the gloves allow for a level of sophistication and development in striking--in both quantity of punches thrown and quality of the complexity of technique--that far exceeds the more direct and sometimes more lethal striking in MMA.
“It's sort of like a genius of the epee [a thin fencing sword] getting his clock cleaned by a guy with a shovel. The epee's great in a swordfight, but in a different kind of fight the shovel might be just the thing. Doesn't make the epee any less beautiful, nor does it make high-level fencing any less sophisticated, and a guy with a shovel isn't going to last long in a straight swordfight, but the fact that the lovely epee and all the richness of technique that has grown up around it might be the wrong tool for the job in certain circumstances is a testament to the variety of leverage, distance, and decisiveness in different fighting styles.”
I think this is very true (and well-written), boxing striking is more beautiful and elegant than MMA striking. It may have something to do with “use,” those boxers spend their whole lives working in that small arena, essentially toe-to-toe, trying to hit without getting hit. They become masterful at it, and move into the realm of “poetry-in-motion.”
Carlo’s comments reveal some of the old bias (c’mon, an epee versus a shovel?) but there are some interesting truths behind it. He talks about using the right tool for the job, and in MMA the right tool is quite different than the boxing tool.
