This isn't meant to be a Conor bashing thread. I create these threads because I know that I provide deep, intellectual, fight analysis for all of the forum to think about and enjoy. I am a fan of Conor, so all of his rapid fanboys who managed to escape the Asylum better not call me out for being a hater just because I feel the man is in big trouble come fight night. I am about to open the eyes of people who think Conor will win and change the opinion of even the most diehard Conor fan with the analysis. Let's begin shall we?
Alverez is a decent fighter but it's questionable whether or not he's above the Dustin Poirier's of the world. He was champ and somehow beat RDA but everybody knows RDA wins that fight 9/10 times and no fluke punch will ever change that.
The Alverez fight had Conor looking like a million bucks. Partly because Alverez just isn't that much of a smart fighter. Alverez came into the fight trying to use his boxing to setup his shitty takedowns. That was the first problem. At one point he runs directly at Conor with a combo just like Aldo did and got blasted. For too long he tried to box a skilled boxer with a 5 inch reach advantage instead of mixing in his takedowns and paid the price. Not to mention, he isn't that much of a great wrestler to begin with.
He gave Conor way too much time to think instead of coming in aggressive and didn't chain his takedown attempts well enough when he did come into range.
The thing is, when watching that fight, Conor couldn't have been much better .....and you know what? If that fight happened the same way that it did, only you replace Alverez with Khabib, Khabib most likely wins. Alverez got hit around a bunch during that fight but there was no one punch KO like so many people seem to think Conor is capable of doing to anybody. Eddie got hit but still had plenty of time to regain himself and go for takedown attempts. Conor clearly changed his stance for this fight in order to make it hard for Eddie to get his hands on him and guess what? He still did. Got Conor in the clinch and in situations that Khabib would have no doubt taken him down in.
You see.....the problem is most people are too blind to realize that while that was an excellent performance, smart people like me see all of the oppenings that Conor left that would have gave someone like Khabib a great oppertunity to have success.
Khabib is also taller that Alverez. I was shocked to see the height difference between the two, especially when Alverez is listed at 5'9 by the UFC but that clearly wasn't the case. Conor had at least 2 inches on him. That combined with the huge reach advantage spelled trouble for Alverez before the fight even started. The fact is, Conor will always beat people he dwarfs. It's like Jon Jones. Jones only really ever had problems with Gus because he was the same size as him. Those guys are too good at distance control and are too skilled for smaller fighters to be effective on them because they are bigger but yet still just as fast and skilled as their opponents. They don't lose anything while also having the height and reach advantage. What happened when Conor fought Nate? He was getting hit and lost because for once, he was fighting someone who couldn't completely bully.
Now I know what you're thinking. Khabib is taller than Conor but has a worse reach than Alverez.....that's true, but Khabib won't need to box Conor much at all. The fact that Khabib is just as tall as Conor and will be level with him is good because we all know how Conor's confidence is shook when he can't dwarf someone.
There ya go
