is Khamzat the most "goalpost-moved" fighter ever?

[m249viking]

I saw some posts on the internet that I disagree with so in my mind I created this fantasy where a majority of the world population was talking smack against the male athlete that I adore so I made this lengthy thread.

 

[Iroh]

You seem to think him slowing down was all about his hand being injured, I don't agree.

Finally! Thank you for addressing that point. Well, you are free to disagree, bud.

It was not all about it, but it was the single most important contributing factor, IMO.

I thought him starting off the second round with a drastic change in pace looked intentional and not forced by fatigue from the instance I watched it. So please make an argument that pertains to the fight with Usman itself and not to prior signs of fatigue in different fights or wrestling matches.

Also, I thought the flurry he gave at the end showed he still had a good bit left in the tank, which to me indicates that we can't really use tthe fight as a strong indicator of what the limit of his gas tank is at that point of his career. Because there is no real knowing how much more there was still left in the tank, IMO.

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

Finally! Thank you for addressing that point. Well, you are free to disagree, bud.

It was not all about it, but it was the single most important contributing factor, IMO.

I thought him starting off the second round with a drastic change in pace looked intentional and not forced by fatigue from the instance I watched it. So please make an argument that pertains to the fight with Usman itself and not to prior signs of fatigue in different fights or wrestling matches.

Also, I thought the flurry he gave at the end showed he still had a good bit left in the tank, which to me indicates that we can't really use tthe fight as a strong indicator of what the limit of his gas tank is at that point of his career. Because there is no real knowing how much more there was still left in the tank, IMO.

If I didn't say that before that's my bad, but I thought I did and he slowed down a good bit against Burns as well and there was no injury which to me indicates it's more a cardio problem than being the result of an injured hand.

I think using prior fights to gage a fighter's cardio is fair game and should be done unless something drastically changes like DDP with his nose surgery which greatly increased his oxygen intake while fighting.

 

[kalabula]

It’s an interesting argumanet. But the criticism aren’t completely unfounded.

 

[Iroh]

If I didn't say that before that's my bad, but I thought I did and he slowed down a good bit against Burns as well and there was no injury which to me indicates it's more a cardio problem than being the result of an injured hand.

He expended a lot more energy in that fight though. He also got rocked hard and he still poured it on in the third. That's a completely different kind of energy expenditure, than in this fight. It also didn't have such a drastic drop off in pace as in the Usman fight, and it was definitely more tiring, IMO. So how would that make sense that the bigger drop off in pace would be caused by the lesser draining fight, if it were caused by fatigue?

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

He expended a lot more energy in that fight though. He also got rocked hard and he still poured it on in the third. That's a completely different kind of energy expenditure, than in this fight. It also didn't have such a drastic drop in pace as in the Usman fight, and it was definitely more tiring, IMO. So how would that make sense that the bigger drop off in pace would be caused by the lesser draining fight, if it were caused by fatigue?

I don't agree with that, grappling is a lot more tring than striking in general and round 1 of the Usman fight had a lot more grappling.

I think the premise of your post here is not accurate. More strikes were thrown in round 1 of Khamzat vs Burns yes but grappling is more tiring than striking is.

 

[Iroh]

I don't agree with that, grappling is a lot more tring than striking in general and round 1 of the Usman fight had a lot more grappling.

I think the premise of your post here is not accurate. More strikes were thrown in round 1 of Khamzat vs Burns yes but grappling is more tiring than striking is.

Nah, it's all what your body has trained to do the most. If you have done the countless of hours of grappling since you were a child like Khamzat has, then that's the lesser tiring part. Of course, you can still go over the top with it if you want to and tire yourself out. But the striking part is what the body's cardiovascular system has been less molded to support than the grappling movement, if you are also going all out on striking, like Khamzat was in the Burns fight. The technique also drops quicker when ramping up and that's why he looked so sloppy.

But hanging around on Usman's back is not exactly tiring.

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

Nah, it's all what your body has trained to do the most. If you have done the countless of hours of grappling since you were a child like Khamzat has, then that's the lesser tiring part. Of course, you can still go over the top woth it if you want to. But the striking part is what the body's cardiovascular system has been less molded to support than the grappling movements. If you are also going all out on striking, like Khamzat was. The technique also drops quicker and that's why he looked so sloppy.

But hanging around on Usman's back is not exactly tiring.

That hasn't been my experience or what I have seen when people grapple and meet resistance. I wrestled for years and when I started doing kickboxing it was a lot less tiring and I had much more conditioning training for grappling.

 

[Iroh]

That hasn't been my experience or what I have seen when people grapple and meet resistance. I wrestled for years and when I started doing kickboxing it was a lot less tiring and I had much more conditioning training for grappling.

I mean, I get what you are saying. Nobody is going all out wrestling for 30 minutes but you can do it in striking if you have superb cardio. So in absolute terms you are right. But there are still different types of cardio, because if you have a great striking cardio, that is not directly going to translate to an equally great grappling cardio if your body has never grappled before and vice versa . So you gotta train them individually if you are to have the stamina for both. But obviously there is also overlap in them, because they make use of the same lungs and larger blood vessels.

But the overall grappling exchanges weren't that extremely intensive and a lot was just Khamzat on Usman's back looking for Usman to give him something. And literally everybody who has trained with Khamzat says he is a beast in training. I just find it very hard to believe that everybody is just covering for him actually having a 1 round gastank of which a large part was spend on the back of his opponent and leaning on him.

 

[mister piscadinha]

UFC themselves said that though. There were stats after the last Leon fight showing that Usman had the best % in the org. *shrugs*

I don't have a screenshot handy but it was one of their three fighter bulletpoints as Kamaru walked into the cage the night he fought Khamzat

You think Costa is a better striker than Kamaru? Based on what fight specifically?

lol at somehow thinking that if you're a betting favorite that somehow it means Sherdog threads don't say you'll lose or get exposed

usman seems better than he is cause of the wrestling threat
negate that and you have a powerful but very basic striker
costa is a natural, with a more fluid and diverse striking arsenal

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Really?? Which one of the fights above you think did NOT play out as described on this forum?

Well, no one ever claimed Leech was near the "top of the division" and basically everyone knew Holland would get steam rolled, as long as Khamzat wasn't drained from that weight cut, which was the only question mark. Additionally, people may have thought Usman was better, with a full camp and at WW, but he was a late fill-in and already getting criticisms for not having knees anymore, so I don't remember many people acting like Khamzat couldn't win

 

[Luckyme]

Usman, CCc, Gaethje and Khabib also seem to be pals with him with no consequences.

Theres dozens of pictures of Khabib with Kadyrov, he even came to his fights.

They're American, they don't need a visa to enter the US. As for Khabib, he didn't hobnob with Kadyrov the way Khamzat has.

 

[surgeyou1]

If he beats Whittaker he would fully deserve a title shot.

 

[don't ask]

Khamzat is such a weird fighter to judge because he's taken very few fights that let us gauge where he should be in any division and he does more things that flash-in-the-pan flameouts do than successful champions do.

 

[Neck&Neck]

If he beats Hobbie in the first 30 seconds I might even say
Khmazat did OK in the UFC

 

[Dionysian]

Well, no one ever claimed Leech was near the "top of the division" and basically everyone knew Holland would get steam rolled, as long as Khamzat wasn't drained from that weight cut, which was the only question mark. Additionally, people may have thought Usman was better, with a full camp and at WW, but he was a late fill-in and already getting criticisms for not having knees anymore, so I don't remember many people acting like Khamzat couldn't win

Li was ranked 11 at the time. So yeah I used "top" to mean "top 10". And yes, back then people absolutely said he'd get exposed when he fought someone near the top 10.

Multiple people said Kevin was the "true" top fighter of 2020 (his best year for sure). The "everyone knew" line is a bit revisionist like the "no knees" bullshit. No one said Kamaru had no knees when he was champ, but I guess losing an extremely close decision to Leon conveniently made his knees explode days before fighting Khamzat.

More of the same dismissal bullshit. Just like how everyone is now saying Holland had no chance and Kamaru had no knees is goalpost moving bullshit. Next up is Robert (worst stylistic match in the either WW or MW by the way) is a WW bum / quickly tossing his legacy in the toilet rather than acknowledge how big of a deal it'd be if Khamzat wins.

 

[Dionysian]

usman seems better than he is cause of the wrestling threat
negate that and you have a powerful but very basic striker
costa is a natural, with a more fluid and diverse striking arsenal

Maybe but fact is I have never seen Costa do anything as impressive on the feet as Kamaru dropping Burns with a jab or sending Masvidal to another dimension the way he did.

I saw some posts on the internet that I disagree with so in my mind I created this fantasy where a majority of the world population was talking smack against the male athlete that I adore so I made this lengthy thread.

I never said it was majority of the world population

It is just a tiny, loud population of bitch-heavy posters

 

[moreorless87]

To be honest his recent fights made me buy into him more not less, MMA fighters who get hype destroying low/mid level opponents on the way up are pretty common, MMA fighters who have the guts to win competitive wars are much rarer.

 

[HavokHarmon]

The Burns and Li wins were legit. Granted he did show a propensity to get tagged in the Burns fight but I don’t put too much stock in that.

Problem is that the other two fights you listed, I don’t know how much we can take from them. In both cases his opponent was a late replacement. In Hollands case Khazmat missed weight and in Usmans case Marty was moving up in weight on just a few days notice. We don’t know how good Usman is at mw going into that fight, and we certainly don’t know how good he is on 10 days notice so it’s not a surprise that a lot of people don’t see a lot of value in that win because it’s hard to know how valuable it actually is.

On top of that his wins are spread between two weight classes, one that he’s enormous at and can’t make consistently and the other he only has the aforementioned win over Usman that’s of any real note as his other fights at mw have been against lower level competition. And the Holland win was at a catch weight so it’s hard to know how to rank him based on that either.

Personally I’d like to see him commit to a weight and stick there making weight, whichever one that happens to be. I would then like to see him get at least a couple wins against top 10 guys with full camps. That’s basically the same standard I have for anyone.

 

[Mmmmmmma1234]

I've honestly never seen anything like this.

BEFORE: "He will be exposed the second he fights someone in the UFC. So much hype"

THEN: *steamrolls PHILLIPS without taking one hit*

AFTER: "lol PHILLIPS sucks"
BEFORE: "He will be exposed the second he fights McKee he's the next Conor McGregor. So much hype"
THEN: *steamrolls McKee without taking one hit*
AFTER: "lol McKee sucks"
BEFORE: "He will be exposed the second he fights someone towards the top of the division. So much hype"
THEN: *steamrolls GM3 without taking one hit*
AFTER: "lol GM3 sucks"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed the second he fights someone towards the top of the division. So much hype"
THEN: *steamrolls Li without taking one hit*
AFTER: "lol Li sucks"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed. Finally he is fighting a real WW!"
THEN: *beats top 3 Burns who is a stylistic nightmare in a FOTY*
AFTER: "lol Burns is a LW and should have won"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed. Kevin is the true fighter of 2020 not Khamzat."
THEN: *steamrolls Kevin without taking one hit*
AFTER: "lol Kevin sucks"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed. Kamaru is so much better. Khamzat has no way to win."
THEN: *one fight removed from an extremely close WW title fight, long-time dominant WW champ with the best TDD in the whole UFC gets soundly outgrappled for the first time in his life / loses decision*
AFTER: "lol Kamaru sucks / is a WW / lol he has no knees / he is 80 years old"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed. Finally he is fighting a real MW!"
THEN: *Costa pulls out*
AFTER: "lol Khamzat doesn't fight!"

BEFORE: "He will be exposed. Finally he is fighting a real MW!"
MY GUESS "THEN": Khamzat wins vs the former MW champ / top 5 MW figher / stylistic nightmare
MY GUESS "AFTER": "lol Rob sucks / he was a WW / he is 80 years old"

I know haters have existed since the sport began but I've never seen so much goal-post-moving for a single fighter in the sport's history. Can you think of anything in MMA history that rivals this level of psychosis or shameless goalpost moving?

Fixed it for you can't forget all those highest level opponent he crushed while everyone moved the posts.