This article is part of a larger effort by MixedMartialrts.com, to understand what techniques and approaches work best, not by looking at bouts in the arena, but by looking at what happens on the streets. Check out more stories on:
• Martial Arts on The Street
• Mutual Combat
• Style vs. Style
It’s always the guy who doesn’t want to fight who can fight.
The video below does not clearly show what started this mutual combat, but it’s abundantly apparent that the guy in the dark shorts didn’t really want to fight, and the guy in the green shorts did. It’s also very clear that the MMA-trained guy purposefully did not take advantage of all the opportunities that arose to end the fight – when he easily could have.
Dark shorts appears to a solid student of mixed martial arts, although likely not an active competitor. Still, his training was easily sufficient to handle the larger antagonist. In the opening of the video, he is standing with his hands clasped, refusing the throw the first punch.
Fight breakdown
As green shorts moves forward, hands up, intent on landing a punch, MMA guy in the dark shorts uses his footwork to manage distance. When green shorts edges into a distance where a calf kick lands, but punches don’t, he calf kicks. A low kick to the thigh would require closer distance, as the shin rather than the foot is required to cause damage. But to the calf, the foot is sufficient, as you can see.
Green shorts is knocked off balance and MMA guy throws two right hands, a la Chris Weidman vs. Anderson Silva I. The second straight lands clean, sending green shorts arcing oddly to the ground, momentarily achieving a near parallel status, until he lands and eats three more rights in quick succession.
At this point, it is all over.
But then green shorts rises to his feet, where he unknowingly finds himself on Queer Street. He unsteadily charges, repeatedly, as MMA man tries to walk away, eventually eating yet another straight right, and getting dropped again. And he rises again, only to lean on a nearby fire hydrant for balance.
MMA man is walking away as green shorts follows him trying to further engage. Unfortunately, in the adrenalized moment, MMA man did not realize he had left his backpack behind, and when green shorts moves for it, MMA man runs forward, only to briefly fall to the ground.
MMA man rises and clinches, asks onlookers to break it up, and again tries to walk away. But when green shorts again moves to the backpack, MMA man employs a running “THIS IS SPARTAAAAA!!!!” kick and lands a few more shots, whereupon his hair is grabbed.
The hair grab is clearly a new situation for MMA man, and for a time he simply tries to hold the aggressor’s arm and again asks for help breaking it up, with mixed results. Seconds pass, and despite the unfamiliarity of a hair-pull, MMA man realizes an elbow will land, and lands it.
This gets street Joe Rogan, who has been doing a first-rate job of commentary, to exclaim, “Conor McGregor style!”
MMA man then takes a proven path to street dominance. Takedown, mount, punches, rear mount, rear-naked choke. Then both the video and green shorts fade to black.
It is important here to remember the ancient proverb of the Samurai: “Nana korobi, ya oki.” This translates, roughly, as, “It’s not how many times you get knocked down that counts, it’s how many times you get back up and stagger around like a newborn foal that thinks he’s a Terminator, in a fight you’ve already lost.”
And lastly, kudos to green shorts’ brother, who when goaded into entering a fair fight, replies, “It’s not worthwhile; I’m not going to jail, too.”
Share your own thoughts about what happened, on The UnderGround forum at MixedMartialArts.com.
