Justin Can't Beat Tony

[RaZer Cruz]

Sure

Good luck mate. I'll immortalise you in my signature if Justin goes down.

 

[podsox]

Reason 1: Gaethje needs a knockout; how has he improved since his fight with Poirer and why has he been knocking Mfers out

Gaethje hasn't gained some serious power in his last three fights. In the last two gifs his opponents got knocked out because they were pressured against the cage with their hands down. I can tell you this won't happen to Tony because Tony doesn't get pressured. I'll explain further down below.

In this gif cowboy gets countered. Throughout the fight Gaethje was using his footwork to move in and out of range from different angles because Cowboy usually blitzes in with his chin up and throws two-three punch combinations. This is a tendency from Cowboy and he does this all the time.

So again, Gaethje hasn't gained some incredible power in his last three fights. This is a myth. He wasn't able to one punch KO Johnson, Alvarez, or Poirer because he couldn't land clean on them with good stamina. What has happened is he's become a better technical fighter. Instead of walking forward with his hands up he's been using his footwork and angles to cut off the octagon, push fighters against the fence, or counter, and land clean shots with good energy level. His striking has actually become incredibly similar, almost to Rose Namajunas, which isn't surprising considering they have the same coach Trevor Witman.

As you can see, Rose uses her angles and footwork to pressure Joanna against the cage, trapping her by throwing a good timed left hook preventing her from circling to her right, and finishing with a right in case she tried to go to her left.

Reason 2: Gaethje isn't a good finisher
As we see, when Gaethje uses his technical skills he can one punch knockout people, but as seen throughout his career, Gaethje isn't the best finisher. We never really have seen his top game, so in case he does land on Tony and knock him down its hard to know what will happen when he gots on top. Most likely since he doesn't have much experience with ground and pound in high level MMA fights, he won't do as good as Tony, who has shown he can recover even when he gets hit, and be a threat from the bottom.

In the Alvarez and Poirer fight he hurt both of them, but lacked the ability to finish them. Even in the Johnson fight he hurt Johnson and finished him, but Johnson was exhausted and just stood there, no footwork, movement, anything. Our best reference is the Alvarez and Poirer fight. Gaethje just hasn't shown the ability to finish high level opponents when he's had them hurt.

A counter argument could be is that in those fights Gaethje hadn't preserved his energy levels, so a good case could be that he can still knockout Ferguson in the first or second round. which leads to my conclusion

Gaethje can't knock Tony out
because doing so would require Gaethje to have better footwork and be better than cutting off the cage than Tony. which Tony is a master at and better. Look at the Pettis fight, and analyze how Tony switches stances constantly to prevent Pettis from circling out of his strikes. Every time he does, Pettis moves into his shot, Tony inflicting more damage. Tony is also good at Feinting and moving his head to give false reads to his opponent and make them strike inaccurate. He uses his feints to push them against the cage and has odd timing allowing him to strike when they are thinking about offense instead of defense This makes them get tired and pressured against the cage. Same in the RDA fight. Gaethje pressure is rather one dimensional, he relies on throwing leg kicks and clinching his opponent.

Here we see him clinch Johnson against the cage and beat him up. Here's the antithesis when he does it against Alvarez

we see him try to clinch Alvarez here and get knocked out; if he does this against Tony, he will eat Elbows and get cut rather soon.

Second part to my conclusion is Gaethje beating Tony would require Gaethje to have proved he is a better finisher than Tony is at recovering; I believe this not to be true.

so I believe all signs point to Gaethje getting elbowed, cut open, pressured against the fence, then panic wrestling and getting D'arced in 2:32 of the third round.

Justin doesn’t panic wrestle though. When he gets rocked he just tucks his chin and starts swinging

 

[empsim]

He can definitely KO him. If not, he is going to have a very bad night.

 

[Medulla Omoplata]

Tony gets slobber knocked in every fight, why do people keep saying Justin will have trouble landing?
Tony's wild footwork and feints and constant activity make it hard to find his head for sure but it also causes him to be off balance, put his head in bad positions,and leave his chin up.
I agree with questioning Justin's top game. He may have been a great wrestler back in the day but he hasn't shown it in MMA, and if you don't use it you lose it.
That might be Tony's saving grace here.

 

[Dbreiden83080]

Of course he can. And don’t jinx Tony.

 

[chinarice]

He can beat Tony. Justin hits hard as hell. Sure, Tony can recover quick and has every time.

He's had serious surgeries, is up there in age and tends to get into dogfights with guys. These will always be winnable fights for a guy like Justin Gaethje.

I think Tony beats Gaethje as well, however, I think Tony's gonna get hurt early.... we'll see what happens.

 

[fortheo]

Reason 1: Gaethje needs a knockout; how has he improved since his fight with Poirer and why has he been knocking Mfers out

Gaethje hasn't gained some serious power in his last three fights. In the last two gifs his opponents got knocked out because they were pressured against the cage with their hands down. I can tell you this won't happen to Tony because Tony doesn't get pressured.

You said Tony doesn't get pressured, but RDA pressured him a bit throughout their fight, effectively cutting tony off and forcing tony to scale the cage. Tony was in control for a large part of that fight, but RDA definitely pressured him. As of late, tony hasn't really been fighting pressure fighters.

In this gif cowboy gets countered. Throughout the fight Gaethje was using his footwork to move in and out of range from different angles because Cowboy usually blitzes in with his chin up and throws two-three punch combinations. This is a tendency from Cowboy and he does this all the time.

You know who else closes the range and is open to get countered?

Our best reference is the Alvarez and Poirer fight. Gaethje just hasn't shown the ability to finish high level opponents when he's had them hurt.

Why is that our best reference? Who has tony finished as high level as those guys? Tony's best win is an RDA who had just been finished by Alvarez, and tony couldn't finish RDA. Critiquing Gaethje's finishing ability based off of not being able to finish Alvarez and Dustin—two very high quality guys, probably better than anyone on Tony's resume—seems a bit unfair. You can turn that logic around on Tony very quickly: the only guy at that level tony faced was RDA and Tony couldn't finish him.

 

[12ga.]

Bullshit thread. Cant is ridiculous. Literally any pro fighter can beat another. hell even training partners beat these guys some days. Key for gathje is get inside and catch Tony with some hot shit early. Key for tony is use jab teeps and other distance keeping until Justins power diminishes then take it too him. I predict Darce in 3 but Justin has some dangerous weapons early.

 

[Osiris3657]

Stopped browsing at "Gaethje isn't much of a finisher"

 

[mkess101]

Of course he can beat him, WTF? I think Tony wins, I think he's plain and simple the better fighter, but FFS we aren't talking about some scrub they pulled off a bartstool. Justin is legit, has good power, gritty as hell. Tony's 36 and while he's different from most people so maybe traditional age decline isn't the same for him, that's ANCIENT for a LW who's atop the rankings. It's an unreal accomplishment in and of itself that Tony's been able to do this, but Father Time is undefeated and Tony's fighting a super dangerous opponent.

 

[Overboostin]

I'm curious to see if Gaethje is willing to follow Tony to the ground if he hurts him. When Justin fought Michael Johnson he kept letting him stand back up instead of following him to the ground. If he takes that approach he will basically need to put Tony out cold or land a flurry of punches against the cage to win inside the distance.

 

[MMAcolyte]

Good post. Other than the "can't" nonsense. Super stupid word to use in this context, but I'm guessing that's intentional.

 

[cauti0n]

Gaethje can beat anyone if he lands, Ferguson's just bleed recklessness could easily get him in trouble vs a guy like gaethje. Anyone pretending otherwise is fulla shit.

That said War Tony.

This. This is a 50/50 fight tbh.

 

[wanted226]

This. This is a 50/50 fight tbh.

I agree
50%tony by sub
50%tony by ko

 

[ArtemV]

Wow, you have some really bad takes.

Justin isn't a good finisher? Ferguson is a master at cutting off the cage? why was Cerrone able to consistently get back to the center of the cage?

How has Gaethje improved? He is much wiser with his shot selection and he is much better at subtly pressuring his opponents.

Gaethje cannot knock Ferguson out? lmao, this one is probably your worst take.

When was the last time Ferguson faced anybody with power like Gaethje has? and it hasn't been like Ferguson has been dropped against weaker punchers (Vanatta and Pettis).

You really are stupid.

 

[scytheavatar]

What about the leg kicks of Gaethje? Afaik, Tony isn't the best at defending leg kicks and Justin kicks so hard that Barboza stopped kicking with him.

Edit: plus Tony's knees had torn ligaments before.

Pettis started his match against Ferguson leg kicking him but then stopped doing it. Leg kicks are useless against Ferguson cause it's near impossible to land leg kicks on Ferguson when he's raining punches on your head. His square stance and constant stance switching limits the effectiveness of leg kicks too. This is another reason why Gaethje will lose to Ferguson, without leg kicks I do not know how he is going to be able to get Ferguson to back off.

 

[Gilday]

Tony doesn't move his head much and recently is getting dropped a lot.
Gaethje has been less reckless in his last few fights and is coming off 3 first round KO's.

Tony is the rightful favourite, but to think Gaethje can't beat him is just dumb

 

[poor form]

When casuals start threads. This is the result.

Great job on allowing white belts to start threads again, btw.

 

[epic1stpost]

All the dumb shit tonys been saying about khabib I hope Justin smashes him.

 

[Joseph_McBride]

Tighter punching mechanics = more power. So yes, his power has actually improved because of this improvement.

He's also implemented shifting into his pressure game vs Barboza, definitely a new wrinkle.

Will he beat Tony, maybe not. Can he? Absolutely.