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First Things First
UFC 299 was an excellent pay-per-view. There were historically bad beatings and a few jaw-dropping stoppages. Let's take a closer look at the latter.
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What's In Today's Letter?
UFC 299
Miami hosted an action-packed pay-per-view card this weekend. The main event featured Sean O’Malley’s first title defense, a rematch against Chito Vera. The fight will be remembered as one of the toughest displays of durability that you will ever see.
O’Malley won every round with a fairly wide margin. All in all, O’Malley landed 230 strikes to 89 from Vera. I’m still not sure how Chito stayed on his feet the whole time.
Because there was basically no grappling in O’Malley and Vera’s fight, we’re going to take a closer look at some fighters who all have a problem being predictable. Let’s start with the preliminary headliner, Jailton Almeida vs Curtis Blaydes.
Jailton Almeida vs Curtis Blaydes
Almeida is one of the most limited and unbalanced fighters on the UFC’s roster. His wrestling is janky, but it generally gets the job done. And his top control can be smothering if not outright vicious. Almeida’s striking is non-existent though.
Most of Almeida’s fights involve him diving across the cage at his opponents. He drops to his knees and tries to finish awkward wrestling shots without throwing many strikes. Recently, Almeida has added some cool new clinch techniques to break his opponents' base.
Back Body Lock → Kick Base  | Almeida has a back body lock. Blaydes’s hips are far back so he doesn’t get lifted easily. Blaydes’s hip position means his center of gravity is off so Almeida kicks his base out to throw him to the floor. |
Here’s the problem. Blaydes is a young veteran with great wrestling for a heavyweight. He got taken down, but he did not accept bottom position.
Almeida was able to hold onto Blaydes, but he couldn’t score. And because he couldn’t impact Blaydes, Almeida held on tighter and tighter.
After losing a relatively boring first round, Blaydes knew Almeida was going to do two things. Shoot and hold on for dear life. And if you know your opponent isn’t going to try to hit you, you might as well fire at will.
Double Leg → Sprawl → Single →  | Almeida shoots a double from far out and Blaydes down blocks to stop the takedown. They end on the fence with Almeida’s hands locked on a single but Blaydes’s base is wide so Almeida can’t off balance him. Almeida gets stuck under Blaydes on his knees eating hammer fists until he loses consciousness. |
Almeida had the fight closer to where he wanted to be. That didn’t mean he was safe.
Blaydes knew Almeida would keep his hands locked, so he just unloaded on him and separated him from his senses.
Almeida seems to have taken a step back. He used to hit his opponents more and threaten chokes as soon as he started getting ahead of them in grappling exchanges. I wouldn’t mind seeing Almeida trying 205 again.
Gilbert Burns vs Jack Della Maddalena
This performance was incredible. It might be getting overlooked a bit because of Dustin Poirier’s gutsy knockout win but this fight is a must-watch for any fight fan.
Burns is an IBJJF world champion and former UFC title challenger. He’s also 37. Burns was doing everything he could to hold onto his title aspirations and hold off the surging 27 year old Maddalena.
Maddalena was pressuring Burns with world-class offensive footwork. Burns was stabbing in hard counter shots and takedown attempts. He could get Maddalena down, but couldn’t do much with the takedowns. Maddalena used every opportunity to hit and hurt Burns.
Harai Goshi → Knee  | Burns is pressing Maddalena to the fence with an over under clinch. Maddalena punches Burns’s gut. Maddalena blocks Burns’s knee with his own and uses it to step past Burns for the harai goshi. Burns narrowly avoids Maddalena’s knee to the face as he stands. |
This knee will be important later.
Burns had more success with his grappling in the second round. That doesn’t mean Maddalena was lost though.
Maddalena was countering Burns by threatening switches, octopus guard, and stand ups. Burns used classic wrestling to cradle Maddalena and settle him down.
Double Leg → Octopus Guard → Cradle  | Burns takes Maddalena down with a double leg. Maddalena goes to octopus guard to stand and Burns stops it by locking his hands arounds Maddalena’s head and leg for a cradle. Burns holds the cradle and runs Maddalena to the floor. |
With Burns closer to Maddalena’s center he could finally settle into a dominant position. Seconds later Burns worked to Maddalena’s back side to seal the round.
Passing → Triangle Attempt → Back Mount  | Burns is passing Maddalena’s guard so Maddalena tries to throw up a triangle. Burns shrugs it off and climbs his back before pulling Maddalena into his lap. Burns secures back mount by threatening the neck and locking a body triangle. |
Because Burns threw his bottom hook in and pulled Maddalena back into his lap he was able to hold the position. If he kept trying to wrestle, stay on top, and force the far hook in Burns could have lost control.
Going into the third it was either man’s fight and the paths to victory were clear. Maddalena needed to poke at Burns. Hit him, hurt him, and take the final round. Burns needed to get in on his hips, ground him, and secure a dominant pin. With about two minutes left it looked like that was going to happen.
Back Body Lock → Throw Attempt → Turtle  | Burns is holding a back body lock and Maddalena tries to step past his hips for a throw. Because Maddalena has no control over Burns’s torso he just throws him to the floor, grabs a wrist, and threatens a choke. |
Maddalena wisely stayed glued to the fence. This prevented Burns from sliding his knee into Maddalena’s pocket and securing back mount. But then Burns got greedy and Maddalena made the most of it.
Reverse Z Sweep → Knee →  | Burns pulls Maddalena’s wrist and pressures forward, making his hips rise and giving Maddalena room to push off the floor and elevate him. They scramble to their feet and Burns shoots to reclaim control. Maddalena sees the knee he hunted earlier, sits Burns down, and follows up with ground and pound. |
Fair play to Burns for going for it. He’s a dog. But if he was content to wrist ride and hit Maddalena he probably would have cruised to a decision. If he was a little less predictable he could have stayed safe.
Price Of Predictability
From the second Jack Della Maddalena and Gilbert Burns separated, Maddalena knew Burns would shoot again. Burns was out of options. He had to take the momentum back and steal the fight. You can say the exact same thing about Jailton Almeida and Curtis Blaydes.
Blaydes spent about five minutes getting hugged. He knew he had free rein to hit Almeida as much as he wanted when they clinched because he knew Almeida wasn’t going to open his hands.
Predictability in combat sports is a death sentence. Everyone is beatable, but you become harder to beat as your opponents become less sure of what you’re going to try. That’s why feints and fakes work. It’s why Georges St-Pierre is a hall of famer instead of another has-been. And, sadly, that’s why Burns and Almeida were knocked out Saturday.
On the flip side, unpredictability is exactly why Maddalena is so damn good. He’s technical, but he doesn’t do anything particularly complicated.
Maddalena throws straight punches, hooks, and leg kicks. It’s how he throws them that actually matters.
Maddalena regularly switches stances and targets mid-combination. He’ll start high, switch stances, and end by hitting low. When you fire back he’ll change his stance, retreat on an angle, and tap in another counter you don’t see coming. It’s as fluid as it is fun to watch.
JDM's footwork is unbelievably good
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Mar 11, 2024
Maddalena threw four punches to Burns’s one, he hit the body and the head, and he was on balance the whole time. That makes him frustrating if not completely overwhelming.
I can’t predict what Maddalena will do next but he called out Shavkat Rakhmonov. That fight has instant classic written all over it.
We’ll be here to break down that and any other interesting action that comes from the combat sports world.
Further Viewing
And Three Stories You May Have Missed
One other highly predictable fighter fought this weekend, Dustin Poirier. In basically every fight where Poirier is pushed to the fence he jumps for a guillotine choke even thought he literally has never won a fight with a guillotine. Insane. I made this video about his guillotines in his fight with Benoit Saint-Denis. Check it out if you want to improve your guillotine chokes.
This past Thursday PFL Europe kicked off this year’s fights with a sold out card in France. The main event had some weird drama because the fight was stopped early due to a splinter in one fighter’s toe. You can watch an insane grappling performance from that event here.
Jack Della Maddalena has been training with Australian grappling savant Craig Jones. Last year they actually did an interview for Jones’s podcast. You can listen to it here.
Three Stories You May Have Missed
Last week Bloody Elbow was sold. Since then their new owners have deleted all of Bloody Elbow’s reporting on the UFC’s antritrust lawsuit and other important stories. This loss can’t go overstated. The antitrust reporting is the most important journalism being done in MMA full stop.
The UFC and Venum have extended their partnership through 2029.
Jake Paul and Mike Tyson are going to box. It’s a dumb fight, but it will be broadcast on Netflix. Netflix is the streaming giant. Them getting into combat sports is incredible news.
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