Roach: MMA fighters don’t have much stand up experience
Freddie Roach: “And one thing about the standup of MMA fighters, they don’t have a lot of experience with the standup game, so much. And that proved it right there.”
The great boxing trainer Freddie Roach spoke recently with Marcos Villegas of FightHub, and like everyone else, discussed UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor.
“Obviously he’s fun to watch,” said Roach, as transcribed by Zane Simon for BE. “He talks a good game, he backs it up so far, he’s moving up a weight class. I was just with Georges St-Pierre recently, this week, up in Montreal. Georges might be thinking that he maybe shouldn’t be moving up in weight so quickly, because he says it might be a different outcome with the bigger weight class, of course. But, so far he’s proven everyone wrong and he’s knocking everyone out. He’s fun to watch. I like him.”
Roach also discussed McGregor’s KO of former champion Jose Aldo. Mixed martial arts is an odd sport, in that if you are the best in the world in one component discipline, it necessarily means you did not put the time into other necessary parts of the game. For example, if you are a world class boxer, there are not the hours in the day to also become a solid wrestler, grappler, etc. A world-class boxer might get beat without throwing a single punch.
So when a world-class boxing coach looks at MMA striking, it doesn’t appear world-class. To Roach, Aldo’s boxing looked inexperienced.
“The thing was, it was a great step back, because it’s like people say, ‘Don’t move back in a straight line,’ though,” said Roach. “But if a guy follows you in that straight line, the thing is, it can be very effective. So what he did, he stepped back, but he set himself. He was in the ready position and as Aldo picked his foot up and came to him, he knocked him out with a shot.
“I mean, it’s a very common shot in boxing, but something you teach your fighters not to make that mistake, of course. And one thing about the standup of MMA fighters, they don’t have a lot of experience with the standup game, so much. And that proved it right there. He just doesn’t have a lot of experience in the standup game and he walked right into a shot. Which has happened a couple of times with the Irish boys. But he is fun, he’s exciting, and he can punch.”
Conor McGregor fights UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos on March 5 at UFC 196 in Las Vegas, Nevada.