Official Women's Division Discussion #25

PurpleStorm said:
Kayla has a big friendly personality. Good for the sport. Enjoyed her post-fight interview with Bas Rutten. She mentioned a legend named 'Big Jim' in her corner. Jim Pedro Sr. Anyone know who that is?

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If you’re quizzing us on the Pedro’s sorry I’m advance, but if you’re legitimately curious..

The Pedro’s (Jim Sr was an alternate on the Olympic team, and Jim Jr is one of most decorated US judokas of all time) own a judo school about 45 minutes from my house (in MA). It’s arguably the best Judo School in America. I think they run training camps in New Hampshire for elite athletes. As for as I can tell, most Pedro products are Neweza specialists (grapplers). They trained Kayla, Ronda, and Travis Stevens. Kayla is probably the least specialized on the ground of the 3 (but she also has much better throws and trips than them), yet she was still much better than most of her peers in judo.

As for Kayla’s performance, really no complaints here. She showed excellent control and patience for someone who’s used to having seconds to work on the ground. Relative to her closest counterparts stylistically in Zouak, Ribout, and Mokhnatkina she was much more controlled on the ground, and didn’t get crazy hunting for subs. Obviously there’s lots to work on, but I’m sure Kayla herself knows that. She reminds of a Holly Holm in her work ethic and ability to perform under pressure, fortunately she has a much better team around her. Really excited to see her again soon.
 
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MajorTB said:
If you’re quizzing us on the Pedro’s sorry I’m advance, but if you’re legitimately curious..

The Pedro’s (Jim Sr was an alternate on the Olympic team, and Jim Jr is one of most decorated US judokas of all time) own a judo school about 45 minutes from my house (in MA). It’s arguably the best Judo School in America. I think they run training camps in New Hampshire for elite athletes. As for as I can tell, most Pedro products are Neweza specialists (grapplers). They trained Kayla, Ronda, and Travis Stevens. Kayla is probably the least specialized on the ground of the 3 (but she also has much better throws and trips than them), yet she was still much better than most of her peers in judo.

As for Kayla’s performance, really no complaints here. She showed excellent control and patience for someone who’s used to having seconds to work on the ground. Relative to her closest counterparts stylistically in Zouak, Ribout, and Mokhnatkina she was much more controlled on the ground, and didn’t get crazy hunting for subs. Obviously there’s lots to work on, but I’m sure Kayla herself knows that. She reminds of a Holly Holm in her work ethic and ability to perform under pressure, fortunately she has a much better team around her. Really excited to see her again soon.
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Thanks. Yeah I really didn't know about the Pedro's but that's amazing. I love learning new stuff.
 

Not used to seeing a female Asian fighter look visibly dehydrated tbh


 
Daniel4802 said:
Yeah I don't have Facebook, either, so I didn't watch the fight. Reading the comments, I asume they clinched rather quickly? I'd like to see her gnp as well since people were impressed with it.
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I have no idea either. Hopefully one of the wonderfully sneaky individuals here who find fight footage will post something.
 
Ok, just watched it.

Things I did not like from K:
1. No striking defense and chin was up for the couple of seconds it took her to secure the clinch.

Things I did like:
1. Just about everything else.

She carefully maintained and worked to advance position. GNP was not only solid (the woman can throw with power - an obviously gifted athlete in this respect) she did not spam stupid ass little punches, she picked her shots without sacrificing position. From the guard she postured up, landed some shots (a very good left), controlled her from the back and instead of trying to force the RNC she transitioned to the side/arm and used her legs effectively to help control her opponents position. Once she had wrist control, she just plain over-powered Brittney. And she carried herself well. A very nice addition to the sport.
 
I don’t remember ever seeing ground n pound like that from rousey.
 
Eater of Souls said:
Ok, just watched it.

Things I did not like from K:
1. No striking defense and chin was up for the couple of seconds it took her to secure the clinch.
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Kayla agreed with you. In the post fight conference some journo said your striking was fantastic, Kayla said I don't know what fight you were watching. Made fun of her zombie walk into the clinch. So that's a good sign, the ability to be self-critical. Hope she puts together a streak, the game needs a new star.
 
Dsfdandan said:
I don’t remember ever seeing ground n pound like that from rousey.
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Nah, the little bit she did was a few arm punches. She did have a few decent shots against cage vs. Beth where she used her hips to land a few hooks. The terrible thing about Ronda is that she was a hell of an athlete (not a surprise, I know) but had such shitty coaching and then would not move to a coach worth hog-grinding smother fuck. (I really despise bad coaches) Ronda was not just a one-trick pony as the know-nothings suggest, as she had a wide range of grappling skills and used at least half a dozen different takedowns against Tate alone in their second fight and used a variety of arm-bars to end fights, as well as decent power and very good agility. Exceptional balance as well (again, no surprise, necessary and heavily trained amongst Judoka).

Damn did her attitude suck, though.
 
Askafan said:
Kayla agreed with you. In the post fight conference some journo said your striking was fantastic, Kayla said I don't know what fight you were watching. Made fun of her zombie walk into the clinch. So that's a good sign, the ability to be self-critical. Hope she puts together a streak, the game needs a new star.
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So cool. I like her even more now.

Over/under on when some dunderfuck suggests she fight Cyborg?
 
Askafan said:
Kayla agreed with you. In the post fight conference some journo said your striking was fantastic, Kayla said I don't know what fight you were watching. Made fun of her zombie walk into the clinch. So that's a good sign, the ability to be self-critical. Hope she puts together a streak, the game needs a new star.
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Thanks for saying what happened after the journalist asked that question. I was watching that same interview and after I heard her say that her striking was amazing I instantly cut it off because they were kissing up to the fighter rather than being honest with them. I love that Kayla knew the truth and was truthful with the journalists. If Ronda had this same quality maybe her career would not have turned bad so fast.
 
Eater of Souls said:
Nah, the little bit she did was a few arm punches. She did have a few decent shots against cage vs. Beth where she used her hips to land a few hooks. The terrible thing about Ronda is that she was a hell of an athlete (not a surprise, I know) but had such shitty coaching and then would not move to a coach worth hog-grinding smother fuck. (I really despise bad coaches) Ronda was not just a one-trick pony as the know-nothings suggest, as she had a wide range of grappling skills and used at least half a dozen different takedowns against Tate alone in their second fight and used a variety of arm-bars to end fights, as well as decent power and very good agility. Exceptional balance as well (again, no surprise, necessary and heavily trained amongst Judoka).

Damn did her attitude suck, though.
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This post reminds me of watching a breakdown video of Ronda vs Kaufman. People while watching it will think nothing happened because the fight ended so quickly but the guy who broke it down showed that Kaufman had really good takedown defense but Ronda chained somewhere between 7 and 12 trips and throw attempts in quick succession to get the fight to the ground.

It makes me wonder if Ronda never had her bad knees and could add wrestling to her game how much better she could have been even with the same level of striking. To avoid her Judo throws and trips her opponents are usually putting themselves in position for an easier wrestling style takedown. Ronda was never able to capitalize on this.
 
Rizz said:
This post reminds me of watching a breakdown video of Ronda vs Kaufman. People while watching it will think nothing happened because the fight ended so quickly but the guy who broke it down showed that Kaufman had really good takedown defense but Ronda chained somewhere between 7 and 12 trips and throw attempts in quick succession to get the fight to the ground.

It makes me wonder if Ronda never had her bad knees and could add wrestling to her game how much better she could have been even with the same level of striking. To avoid her Judo throws and trips her opponents are usually putting themselves in position for an easier wrestling style takedown. Ronda was never able to capitalize on this.
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I honestly do not think that Ronda's knees affected her wrestling, although I will allow I lack proper data here. I have seen her use a single, and she trained judo during a time when singles and doubles were actually allowed in competition (Not a big fan of the rule changes myself), Plus, there is a great deal of knee stress with quite a few throws secondary to pivoting.

Again I suspect shit coaching that fostered a sense of entitlement.

Her performance against Zingano (who made a mistake) was a master-class in capitalizing on a specific use of the underhook. She executed a reversal while posting on one foot and upside down, for fucks sake. Another comment on that fight would be the idiots bashing Cat for her comment about "I didn't know Rousey would go for the arm." After Ronda had her back nearly every BJJ player would go for the RNC because that is safer (meaning less likely to result in a sacrifice of position). Ronda slipped to the side and executed a low-percentage/high-risk arm bar flawlessly in about 1.5 seconds.

Great breakdown of Ronda-Tate II:

https://artofgrappling.com/2013/12/29/ufc-168-rousey-tate-judo-throw-highlights-gifs/
 
Something specific I would also like to point out.

https://artofgrappling.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/168-7a.gif?w=470

Another case of Ronda getting bashed by casuals because she landed on her face.
1. So fucking what?
2. She previously over-rotated like many Judoka. We put as much snap as possible into a throw to go for ippon or a full point. This results in the back being exposed, making it easier for someone to achieve back control, which is not an issue in competitive Judo. This is what happened in the fight against Liz where Liz executed a neck crank from hell (Liz being very strong for her size). Ronda did the right thing and stripped Liz's feet first before breaking the hold. She also learned to not over-rotate and face-planting is far more preferable than exposing your back to a grappler.

For me, the Zingano fight marked the end of Ronda's evolution as a grappler, which is too bad as she could have still continued to improve. The fight with Betche was the beginning of the end of her career. Not going to link to videos, anyone can look them up and it pisses me off to watch a coach do this (something that is done to make kids feel better about their striking) but when the mouth-breathing ass-douche would hold pads for her, he would "slap in" or aggressively move the pads in for her to it. This results in faster hands and more noise, so it is a great baby-sitting tool. It also results in the fighter throwing short if they continue to do this (if you watch you can see plenty of Ronda's hooks just wing in and skim by her opponent's face. She never learned to judge distance because Sir Goat-Fuck from Beyond the Crab Nebula would move in instead of forcing her to actually learn to apply footwork.

You can pretty much judge the quality of coaching by the quality of the fundamentals. There are really good coaches who teach very solid fundamentals and it shows in all their students. If you have someone who will not drill the basics, you do not have an athlete, you have a spoiled child. I may not know much about an infinite amount of shit, but I am pretty sure there is no where you get too good at the basics.
 
Is there any chance that Pearl Gonzalez returns to UFC because
she has shown drastic improvement at Invicta thanks to spending
her last 2 fight camps with Manolo Hernandez at San Diego Combat
Academy who also trains Liz Carmouche & Ilima-Lei Macfarlane.
 
I hope so. Would also like to see the Pineapple Princess here. She would be a great addition to 125.
 
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