How Sean Strickland Dismantled Israel Adesanya

[listrahtes]

I was so perplexed why you guys suddenly start talking about WC out of the blue when that has nothing to do with The MMA Analysts post. Looked it through several times where he had written that nonsense. Then I realized the "show ignored content" button and everything was revealed <Lmaoo>

Funny that there are still people around falling for this troll. I think by now most of Sherdog knows he just derails threads with this cult. Enjoy the discussion about Strickland. I did not think he would be able to implement such a gameplan . He obviously had trained a lot for this fight. his reaction time and punch, kick speed seemed to be highly improved to former fights which played a major role.

 

[kenji goh]

Have you ever considered doing it for money? I’m sure there are pro fighters out there who’d pay for a breakdown of a future opponent

Adesanya comes to mind as a guy who would need a service like that if he's gonna rematch Strickland.
It seems he didn't prepare for this fight adequately.

 

[DoctorTaco]

Adesanya comes to mind as a guy who would need a service like that if he's gonna rematch Strickland.
It seems he didn't prepare for this fight adequately.

A good coaching friend posted this:


I feel for them. My guys have lost against opponents who did exactly what we assumed they would, and that sucks. The few times we’ve lost bc they came out and fought completely different though- that hurts way, way more.

 

[TheMaster]

Most boxers are actually better at blocking and parrying than Wing Chun guys though it's not necessarily the first thing people think of when thinking of a boxer.

I take it you mean if they are training 'boxing' extensively in MMA gloves. Then yes, it's quite possible based on the amount of live sparring they do that they will get better timing and reflexes than a WC guy who doesn't. But then we are talking about the sparring not the system itself. WC has way more emphasis on hand and forearm parrying than boxing. I agree that it doesn't matter how you get there, but it does validate the principles of Wing Chun nonetheless even if their lack of sparring means they don't generally get to such a high level of proficiency at it. This will surely encourage more of them to do it though.

Straight punching/the centreline is also something preached in many martial arts although some take it more literally.

Yes it's about the emphasis. Stricklands disciplined emphasis on centreline straight punches from a square stance is very very characteristic of WC. The truth is WC has an uppercut and a hook also but its the centerline punch that the style is famous for so seeing it applied like that so effectively was poetry in motion for any WC man.

The biggest problem with modern Wing Chun is most guys take the punching like a bodybuilding tricep isolation exercise and consequently are noticeably under powered against amateur level combat sports competitors. I don't know enough about Wing Chun to know if this is a bastardised modern interpretation or if it's been like that from jump.

Bad hobbyist Wing Chun with no sparring, which is the norm, is what has made it laughing stock. The real thing should be using tendon power developed over time, and also shoulder and stance turning when needed to add big additional power as well as engagement of the legs. Its whole body power if done properly with the weight behind it.

I do agree with the philosophy that getting good at blocking/parrying should be a higher priority for MMA striking than getting good head movement though it's still worth practising to an extent.

Frankly you have been one of the only sensible ones on this thread other than the OP, because you can analyse what you see clearly and objectively without a fragile ego to defend, which I appreciate.
As you rightly point out, parry and deflection is more important in MMA than head movement.
This is Wing Chun 101 ("the hands move faster than the head") and is anathema to boxing, and had been widely mocked and criticised on here by most in the MMA community and these same people now who have gone into hypercope mode on here.
Yet Strickland has just given a masterclass on it against one of the world's best strikers.

I believe you are more likely to develop good blocks and parries doing some kind of combination of boxing/kickboxing/muay thai or MMA striking than you are training at a Wing Chun school.

If they spar alot live with an uncommon emphasis on it then maybe. If the Wing Chun school spars then maybe not.

It's mostly a semantic argument that I don't really care for, you could call crouching dog style for all I care. I'd rather discuss individual techniques than argue which style first copyrighted the jab.

Yes I agree with you on this which is why I have said Stickland and his trainers have made their own hybrid "Philly Wing Chun" system here by taking Philly shell and adapting it to MMA gloves and ruleset with this square stance, parry deflect, centreline punch, straight thrust kick system.

I've known it can work for 20 years just waited for someone to do it. In fact I have made a few threads over the years specifically talking about Wing Chun and the Philly Shell and Cross block being the one style of boxing that is most similar and how both would be most effective in Bareknuckle fighting. What Strickland has shown is just the tip of the iceberg of what possible in BK rules or with no rules.
And you are in good company to analyse in this way, @Tim Witherspoon has done the same, it takes someone to really see and analyse at a process level of what works, not be a blind follower of the trends of the day. MMA is not fixed, its evolving and this is the next evolution.

 

[shunyata]

I used to compete in kickboxing/muay thai and submission grappling. I'd always planned to have some pro MMA fights, but I stopped doing striking sports before that because I was concerned about head trauma (had like 4 concussions, mainly from stuff outside combat sports). I started doing analysis to help with my own fighting, but at this point I haven't trained in several years and just do it for fun.

It was an excellent read and I appreciated the analysis. You should get together with Jack Slack and start doing some writing or podcasts or something.

 

[DrawK]

I cannot believe TheMaster is still around lol.

 

[DoctorTaco]

It was an excellent read and I appreciated the analysis. You should get together with Jack Slack and start doing some writing or podcasts or something.

10/10 would listen

 

[The Don]

Not classic Philly Shell at all because of the MMA gloves and rulset.

It wasn't Philly Shell at all not because of the ruleset and MMA gloves, but because it didn't use any tools the Philly Shell provides. The only think it had that resembled the Philly Shell was just that, the resemblance of the stance.

MMA has adapted many techniques from Filipino boxing and rates styles to make this work

What's "Filipino boxing?"

I'm generally curious. I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything. But I can't see how Wing Chun can work in combat sports without changing and tweaking it drastically. If it did, we'd have more people actually use it as a base for striking. And having some techniques from it is different from using purely Wing Chun. You could theoretically take some techniques from Aikido and make it work, but it will be so heavily tweaked and change just for it to be viable that it might as well be called something else completely.

 

[biscuitsbrah]

Great stuff as always mm analyst. Loved the detailed write up. I’m curious to how long it takes you to watch these fights and moments over and over again so you can pick up these details?

 

[KBE6EKCTAH_CCP]

One of my key takeaway here (don t know if I wrote this already) is that I amalgamated all forms of speed and concluded Strickland was slow, which was a logical flaw.

Strickland is slow moving, no question about that, but what this fight illustrated is that you can be extremly fast defensively, which Strickland is, and still be quite slow offensively, what Strickland is.

Strickland.has very fast reaction time and will usually block / evade pretty much everything which is thrown at him in single or double shots from distance, which is Adesanya s bread and butter.

Have you guys also noticed that Strickland doesn't flinch at all? He doesn't even close his eyes. He just sees everything.

His system of always threatening with a very sound jab and marching forward, combined with the above, made him a bad match up for Adesanya.

I think this fight illustrates how much of a threat a good defense actually is.

Lastly, I wonder where Strickland picked up the marching fwd with raised knees, as TS observed, the only place I have seen this is in Thai stadiums. Would be interesting if he just figured it on his own.

A closing remark: I think that a good wrestler will give Sean a bunch of trouble. Sean has not faced many of those to my knowledge.

 

[kenji goh]

Adesanya never had good boxing and will always have a problem with a good boxer IMO.

Now a good boxer who can also nullify Izzy's kicking game like Sean, he is a guy that can beat him.

Izzy and his team know better than anyone his weaknesses, so IMO they should have been on their toes up against a guy with Sean's attributes. It's seems they weren't and didn't prepare any special tactic for this match.

 

[TheMaster]

It wasn't Philly Shell at all not because of the ruleset and MMA gloves, but because it didn't use any tools the Philly Shell provides. The only think it had that resembled the Philly Shell was just that, the resemblance of the stance.

I had assumed it was loosely a Philly shell base but heavily modified and adapted to MMA. You say it has no resemblance though to it. So what is Philly Shell supposed to look like?

What's "Filipino boxing?"

I'm generally curious. I'm not trying to be sarcastic or anything.

Filipino boxing is basically a self defence bare fist style. The Filipino arts are different in that they teach weapons first which is the stick or knife, and then the unarmed system is taught last for if you lose your weapon.

So with this in mind as well as regular punching there are extensive use of parrying, deflection, 'limb destruction' (trying to incapacitate the attacking arm), hammerfest and slaps/palm strikes.
There are many applications for it in MMA that have already been adopted and Anderson Silva was one of the most prominent to incorporate it with some WC which it overlaps with by training with Dan Inosanto. Again, it has been battle tested but is for them a secondary system.
This vid cover the basics and has some good drills in it.


The other big advantage of it is like Wing Chun, a lot of the hand methods can readily be adapted to application with use of weapons also.

But I can't see how Wing Chun can work in combat sports without changing and tweaking it drastically. If it did, we'd have more people actually use it as a base for striking. And having some techniques from it is different from using purely Wing Chun.

People don't generally use it as a striking base because of multiple factors, not least of which is its not a combat sport like boxing or kickboxing which obviously lends itself to competition. Its a self defence art and most who train it are hobbyists who are out of shape and don't spar.

So the only two ways you would really see it is if either some Wing Chun guys really wanted to compete and adapted it for ring sports and sparred and cross trained enough to enter MMA, which is rare or;

A guy who came from a different base like boxing or wrestling and competed in MMA, while developing standup skills they heavily modified and adapt the style to make it work and eventually came to the same or very similar system of fighting by a process of elimination.
This is basically what we have seen in this case.

You could theoretically take some techniques from Aikido and make it work, but it will be so heavily tweaked and change just for it to be viable that it might as well be called something else completely.

Well that's pretty much what the majority are trying to do here by claiming Strickland is doing 'boxing'.

One of my key takeaway here (don t know if I wrote this already) is that I amalgamated all forms of speed and concluded Strickland was slow, which was a logical flaw.

Strickland is slow moving, no question about that, but what this fight illustrated is that you can be extremly fast defensively, which Strickland is, and still be quite slow offensively, what Strickland is.

Strickland.has very fast reaction time and will usually block / evade pretty much everything which is thrown at him in single or double shots from distance, which is Adesanya s bread and butter.

Have you guys also noticed that Strickland doesn't flinch at all? He doesn't even close his eyes. He just sees everything.

His system of always threatening with a very sound jab and marching forward, combined with the above, made him a bad match up for Adesanya.

I think this fight illustrates how much of a threat a good defense actually is.

Lastly, I wonder where Strickland picked up the marching fwd with raised knees, as TS observed, the only place I have seen this is in Thai stadiums. Would be interesting if he just figured it on his own.

A closing remark: I think that a good wrestler will give Sean a bunch of trouble. Sean has not faced many of those to my knowledge.

Funny thing is you are pretty much repeating the exact points I am making, only certain posters including you don't have a reflex reaction to attack it.

And yes, Strickland and anyone with this narrow stance walking someone down will have problems with a wrestler. The style is designed for a works best when both want to stand.

 

[shunyata]

One of my key takeaway here (don t know if I wrote this already) is that I amalgamated all forms of speed and concluded Strickland was slow, which was a logical flaw.

Strickland is slow moving, no question about that, but what this fight illustrated is that you can be extremly fast defensively, which Strickland is, and still be quite slow offensively, what Strickland is.

Strickland.has very fast reaction time and will usually block / evade pretty much everything which is thrown at him in single or double shots from distance, which is Adesanya s bread and butter.

Have you guys also noticed that Strickland doesn't flinch at all? He doesn't even close his eyes. He just sees everything.

His system of always threatening with a very sound jab and marching forward, combined with the above, made him a bad match up for Adesanya.

I think this fight illustrates how much of a threat a good defense actually is.

Lastly, I wonder where Strickland picked up the marching fwd with raised knees, as TS observed, the only place I have seen this is in Thai stadiums. Would be interesting if he just figured it on his own.

A closing remark: I think that a good wrestler will give Sean a bunch of trouble. Sean has not faced many of those to my knowledge.

He'd have to fight different vs a wrestleboxer. But I think OP hit the nail on the head that Sean fought this perfectly by plodding forward knee up with an active guard and relentless pressure against a kickboxer who likes to stay on his bicycle and doesn't throw many combos.

Training with Poatan couldn't have hurt.

The strategy would/should be quite different against DDP or Khamzat, both of whom are threats in the clinch with good shot setups but aren't going to be throwing anywhere near as many kicks.

 

[PurpleStorm]

Thank you TS.

 

[The MM Analyst]

Great stuff as always mm analyst. Loved the detailed write up. I’m curious to how long it takes you to watch these fights and moments over and over again so you can pick up these details?

For this one I made a couple twitter threads after the fight that gave me the idea to write it, then watched it over again in the morning to pull out clips. When I do a bigger writeup of a fighter's overall game it takes a long time, but post-fight breakdowns of a single fight are fairly quick.

One of my key takeaway here (don t know if I wrote this already) is that I amalgamated all forms of speed and concluded Strickland was slow, which was a logical flaw.

Strickland is slow moving, no question about that, but what this fight illustrated is that you can be extremly fast defensively, which Strickland is, and still be quite slow offensively, what Strickland is.

Strickland.has very fast reaction time and will usually block / evade pretty much everything which is thrown at him in single or double shots from distance, which is Adesanya s bread and butter.

Have you guys also noticed that Strickland doesn't flinch at all? He doesn't even close his eyes. He just sees everything.

His system of always threatening with a very sound jab and marching forward, combined with the above, made him a bad match up for Adesanya.

I think this fight illustrates how much of a threat a good defense actually is.

Lastly, I wonder where Strickland picked up the marching fwd with raised knees, as TS observed, the only place I have seen this is in Thai stadiums. Would be interesting if he just figured it on his own.

A closing remark: I think that a good wrestler will give Sean a bunch of trouble. Sean has not faced many of those to my knowledge.

That's a really good point about Strickland's eyes. There seems to be a lot of MMA fighters who don't really have a comprehensive defensive system with drilled reactions to every input (as you see from top guys in boxing, muay thai, sometimes kickboxing), but have kind of macgyvered solid defense out of developing good vision and defensive awareness through sparring. It's always exploitable because there's a lot of holes in their defensive system, but unless you have a the specific tools and/or a good plan to exploit it, they can make it real difficult for opponents to hit them clean. Masvidal is kind of that type too, maybe Mousasi. Seems pretty common in guys that start from a young age and spend the first bit of their career as kind of journeymen rather than hot prospects, they develop a style built more on survivability, and tend to be at their best as fighters after you'd expect their physical prime to be over, since their style is more about vision and comfort than leveraging athletic gifts.

 

[The Don]

I had assumed it was loosely a Philly shell base but heavily modified and adapted to MMA. You say it has no resemblance though to it. So what is Philly Shell supposed to look like?

I said it only looks like the Philly Shell. The only similarity they share is just that, it resembles the Philly Shell but it doesn't function like the Philly Shell at all.

Filipino boxing is basically a self defence bare fist style. The Filipino arts are different in that they teach weapons first which is the stick or knife, and then the unarmed system is taught last for if you lose your weapon.



So with this in mind as well as regular punching there are extensive use of parrying, deflection, 'limb destruction' (trying to incapacitate the attacking arm), hammerfest and slaps/palm strikes.
There are many applications for it in MMA that have already been adopted and Anderson Silva was one of the most prominent to incorporate it with some WC which it overlaps with by training with Dan Inosanto. Again, it has been battle tested but is for them a secondary system.
This vid cover the basics and has some good drills in it.

Is this a variation of Eskrima or Kali? Because as knife fighting goes it looks impressive and I would lean to the side of it being quite effective. But as a striking discipline I still have doubts. Incapacitating the arm(s) mid strike is something I really doubt can be done and replicated consistently enough for it to be a staple. Because the way it is trained and practiced is not the same way people, or at least trained fighters strike.

Is it effective against untrained people? I'd assume so, but at that point wouldn't someone be better of just learning wrestling? Or boxing? As they have been stress tested longer and have gone through decades of competition which IS the best way of testing technique efficacy IMO.

The other big advantage of it is like Wing Chun, a lot of the hand methods can readily be adapted to application with use of weapons also.

I didn't look at Wing Chun like that, cheers!

People don't generally use it as a striking base because of multiple factors, not least of which is its not a combat sport like boxing or kickboxing which obviously lends itself to competition. Its a self defence art and most who train it are hobbyists who are out of shape and don't spar.

So the only two ways you would really see it is if either some Wing Chun guys really wanted to compete and adapted it for ring sports and sparred and cross trained enough to enter MMA, which is rare or;

A guy who came from a different base like boxing or wrestling and competed in MMA, while developing standup skills they heavily modified and adapt the style to make it work and eventually came to the same or very similar system of fighting by a process of elimination.
This is basically what we have seen in this case.

To be fair, Anderson Silva is just an elite level striker who is the exception to the rule rather than the rule itself. You teach Silva the most niche of techniques and he'll find a way to make it work.

Well that's pretty much what the majority are trying to do here by claiming Strickland is doing 'boxing'.

I'd argue it's closer to boxing then it is to Wing Chun though, no?

 

[TheMaster]

I said it only looks like the Philly Shell. The only similarity they share is just that, it resembles the Philly Shell but it doesn't function like the Philly Shell at all.

So how is the Philly Shell supposed to function,and can it function in MMA? Several people on this thread have claimed he was doing it, presumably just based on the stance (which he actually alternated between a literal Wing Chun both hands on the centreline stance also at times)

I'd argue it's closer to boxing then it is to Wing Chun though, no?

I would say no not at all. He clearly trained boxing but in terms of modern boxing, the art we see, that wasn't what he was doing in the Octagon.

I posted something clear and important as a distinction between Wing Chun and boxing which I will repeat to anyone who wants to argue it:


Standing in a square stance with very little head or body movement and extensive use of hand parrying and deflections at close range is Wing Chun 101 and is anathema to boxing.


If anyone wants to dispute this let's see what you got. Because as I see it thats a pretty clear distinction. As it stands we can say what we have seen is indeed 'Boxing becomes Wing Chun to win the UFC MW Championship'.

What an awesome time indeed.

 

[The Don]

So how is the Philly Shell supposed to function,and can it function in MMA? Several people on this thread have claimed he was doing it, presumably just based on the stance (which he actually alternated between a literal Wing Chun both hands on the centreline stance also at times)

The Philly Shell looks like the way it does for very specific reasons. You are usually in a much more bladed stance than usual. Your shoulder is there to deflect punches, your rear hand is there to catch or parry jabs. You bend more at the waist, and when done right, crosses and hooks just roll of your shoulder and jabs just get swatted to the side.

James Toney, especially when he was older showcased it perfectly and is an absolute master at the Philly Shell. If you haven't already, dive down that rabbit hole. He is such a pleasure to watch.

I would day no not at all. Unless you want to just say 'anytime someone punches someone and it works it's boxing'. He clearly trained boxing but in terms of modern boxing, the art we see, that wasn't what he was doing in the Octagon.

I posted something clear and important as a distinction between Wing Chun and boxing which I will repeat to anyone who wants to argue it:


Standing in a square stance with very little head or body movement and extensive use of hand parrying and deflections at close range is Wing Chun 101 and is anathema to boxing.


If anyone wants to dispute this let's see what you got. Because as I see it thats a pretty clear distinction. As it stands we can say what we have seen is indeed 'Boxing becomes Wing Chun to win the UFC MW Championship'.

What an awesome time indeed.

Parries, hand trapping and deflecting is not exclusively Wing Chun, though. You could say there were some overlaps in techniques but to say Sean primarily used Wing Chun would be like saying Silva primarily used Wing Chun to beat Nick Diaz. (Or whatever fight Silva had when he playfully used some Wing Chun)

 

[DoctorTaco]

I said it only looks like the Philly Shell. The only similarity they share is just that, it resembles the Philly Shell but it doesn't function like the Philly Shell at all.




Is this a variation of Eskrima or Kali? Because as knife fighting goes it looks impressive and I would lean to the side of it being quite effective. But as a striking discipline I still have doubts. Incapacitating the arm(s) mid strike is something I really doubt can be done and replicated consistently enough for it to be a staple. Because the way it is trained and practiced is not the same way people, or at least trained fighters strike.

Is it effective against untrained people? I'd assume so, but at that point wouldn't someone be better of just learning wrestling? Or boxing? As they have been stress tested longer and have gone through decades of competition which IS the best way of testing technique efficacy IMO.




I didn't look at Wing Chun like that, cheers!



To be fair, Anderson Silva is just an elite level striker who is the exception to the rule rather than the rule itself. You teach Silva the most niche of techniques and he'll find a way to make it work.





I'd argue it's closer to boxing then it is to Wing Chun though, no?

The Philly Shell looks like the way it does for very specific reasons. You are usually in a much more bladed stance than usual. Your shoulder is there to deflect punches, your rear hand is there to catch or parry jabs. You bend more at the waist, and when done right, crosses and hooks just roll of your shoulder and jabs just get swatted to the side.

James Toney, especially when he was older showcased it perfectly and is an absolute master at the Philly Shell. If you haven't already, dive down that rabbit hole. He is such a pleasure to watch.




Parries, hand trapping and deflecting is not exclusively Wing Chun, though. You could say there were some overlaps in techniques but to say Sean primarily used Wing Chun would be like saying Silva primarily used Wing Chun to beat Nick Diaz. (Or whatever fight Silva had when he playfully used some Wing Chun)

you know what they say about playing chess with a pigeon, right?

 

[kumitechamp]

strickland? never trained wc. His coaches? never trained wc. He’s pulling a “master seagal” on you- taking credit for a win despite his MA not having any relevancy in the training of that fighter.

He tells an entertaining story. So much bs everywhere. Next to one mentions things learned through repetition like reflexes and anticipation. Never enough credit given to good hard work.