Alvarez official statement: Honestly, I f@$%ing blew it
Eddie Alvarez lost his lightweight title to Conor McGregor on Saturday night at UFC 205. The King of the Underground…
Eddie Alvarez lost his lightweight title to Conor McGregor on Saturday night at UFC 205. The King of the Underground spoke briefly to the media afterward with grace and dignity, saying, “I’ve never defined myself by a win and I’ll never define myself by a loss.”
Now he has released a fuller message to the fans, via Instagram, that touched on what he did technically wrong. Fighting a Southpaw is inherently challenging, as they are used to people in an orthodox stance, and an orthodox fighter is far less used to training with Southpaws. It is a simple matter of numbers, give that only 10% of the population is left handed, if you are a righty, 90% of the people you spar with have the same side forward that you do. If you are a left, 90% of the people you spar with have the opposite side forward that you do, so you are used to it.
The keys to fighting a Southpaw are very well understood.
Very first, you have to give the Southpaw more room than you would give an orthodox fighter. You can’t stand at your usual distance, as Alvarez did.
Then positioning is where the fight will likely be won. If the Southpaw is squared up, positioning becomes less significant to a degree, but against a fighter like Conor in his side stance, positioning is everything. You have to keep your lead (left) foot – and your lead head – to the outside of your opponent’s lead (right) foot. If you can see inside your opponent’s ear, you are winning. If he can see in your ear, you are losing. Conor could see in Alvarez’s ear, often.
Getting to the outside can be accomplished three broad ways. You can simply keep stepping to the outside, as long as you break it up to the point where you are not too predictable. You should also attack stepping to the outside, as you strike and with an outside single. And you should defend to the outside. Again of course, you can’t do so predictably.
Once you are back a little bit, and moving to the outside, watch out for the straight left. Southpaws hugely develop their straight left. If you focus on jabs the way you might vs. an orthodox fighter, you will lose. The straight left is the danger, and Conor McGregor has by far the best straight left in mixed martial arts.
And you have to change your style of fighting, not sometimes reacting to him and employing your counters, and sometimes attacking. You cannot stop moving, and you have to be aggressive, making him react to you.
Then when you are fighting and trading, you cannot forget any of this. You still have to keep your foot and hand on the outside and watch out for the straight left.
And if you have the edge in wrestling, you have to go heavier on it. Once you have your hands on a southpaw, it is wrestling heaven, as a right lead is normal on the mat. All the striking advantages of a Southpaw go away.
This is all basic and extremely well understood. Eddie Alvarez and his team know how to fight a Southpaw like it is their job. But as Alvarez explains, he didn’t, and he doesn’t know why. The usual responses to fighting a Southpaw are not simple vs. an extraordinary talent like McGregor. But Alvarez was doing the opposite of what he needed to do, like a zombie programmed to walk off a cliff. It is completely baffling, and Alvarez is baffled, too.
“Congrats to Connor and his camp on an amazing accomplishment,” began Alvarez. “These guys continue to deliver, hats off to you fellas. As for my performance , the only thing I can honestly say was ‘I f***ing blew it.’
“I did nothing I trained, I did the complete opposite of what we planned on a daily basis for 10 weeks. To sum up our plan in a sentence it was ‘Go left and mostly wrestle’. Instead, I circled into his left hand and mostly boxed. Fighting the way I did was a for sure death sentence and the result was fitting.
“I say it all the time, there is a really small margin for error at this level and I paid for my mistakes. I managed to make it to the biggest stage and audience in my long career and f***ed it all up when I arrived.
“My heart sincerely hurts and when I dwell on it I fill up with regret and anger. If there was a list of what not to do against an opponent of this nature I did them all on Saturday. I am disappointed in myself and this is not a reflection of my coaches, training partners, and the endless hours of training I commit to this sport.
“Every time I get into the cage I negotiate being vulnerable and possibly embarrassed against the opportunity to do something great and grow more. I always choose the latter regardless of the uncomfortability and anxiety it brings to me. I think this choice is the only reason I ever succeeded in the first place.
“I thought in my head at least making a lot of money would make me happy but I am having a lot of trouble enjoying myself regardless of the check that’s going to be written. I am very uneasy and discontent for the most part.
I am lucky to have my wife and my child at a time like this to help me laugh and smile and let me know everything’s gonna be all right, they are my saving Grace, without them I am a shell of a man. Besides the outcome I thoroughly enjoyed fight week and the lead up, it was a lot fun. I have never defined myself off one win and I’ll never define myself off one loss. I simply had a bad night. I’ll have the opportunity again to have a good one, and I’ll make the walk to see what I got everytime.
“Thanx for listening.”
-EA
