Media Alex Pereira faces off with Ciryl Gane

[TheBulge]

Maybe not the worst idea once he enters his late 30s.

 

[OldBoy91]

I think Gane is the most winnable fight at HW for Poatan.

If he somehow became champ again I think we would see Alex wanting to move up.

Guys like Aspinall and Jones just have ways to make the fight for Poatan really hard. Having Jones or Blaydes on top throwing elbows or 260 pound Aspinall putting all his weight on him and cranking on limbs. Not good for Poatan.

 

[BoxerMaurits]

@BoxerMaurits with another troll poll lol Acting like Gane's gonna get hurt by a guy who fought at middleweight this year, engagement farming at its finest!

Troll poll? That definitely ain’t out of the realm of possibility bud, Poatan is technical finessed and has big power.
There’s been discussions on this fantasy matchup for a reason

 

[BoxerMaurits]

Poatan is definitely not shying away from fighting heavyweights. He made this known before, by calling out reigning GLORY heavyweight-champion Rico Verhoeven to become triple champ, right after winning the LHW-belt against Artem Vakhitov.
Badass move if you ask me:



Unfortunately the Rico Verhoeven fight never materialized, which makes me wonder how Alex Pereira vs Ciryl Gane would play out instead.

Glover Teixeira recently also said Pereira could move up to heavyweight in the future, as he walks around at +- 235lbs.
Three-division champion incoming?

@Safton thoughts on this?
I remember reading a very detailed write-up from you on how Pereira vs Gane could go (not too long ago, in a thread about that potential matchup)

 

[Thepaintbucket]

Alex via submission

 

[svmr_db]

Troll poll? That definitely ain’t out of the realm of possibility bud, Poatan is technical finessed and has big power.
There’s been discussions on this fantasy matchup for a reason

I know the weight cut played a role, but if you're getting slumped like that by a middleweight who was barely 200 lbs in the cage you're definitely getting slumped by Gane who's more agile than 99% of heavyweights & weighing in at 250 lbs.

 

[Portland8242]

Gane is definitely larger, but with a proper move up increasing like 10-12 pounds of muscle Poatan wouldn't be too Much outsized at HW.

Is scary to think how much power this guy can have adding 10+ pounds of pure muscle

He'd still be too outsized. Gane has a much bigger frame that naturally carries a lot more muscle than Poatan, could probably take him down and hold him down relatively easy on size alone.

 

[AdamWarlock]

now that usada gone he just needs to hop on a cycle to get to hw size

easy peasy

 

[Xanzito]

@BoxerMaurits with another troll poll lol Acting like Gane's gonna get hurt by a guy who fought at middleweight this year, engagement farming at its finest!

Let me tell you about a guy named Anthony "Rumble" Johnson...

 

[Xanzito]

He scales to his opponent's size. He stood next to Tyson Fury and didn't look small.

View attachment 1016862

Height and frame cutter for sure.

 

[svmr_db]

Let me tell you about a guy named Anthony "Rumble" Johnson...

Yeah Rumble was once able to make welterweight... draining the hell out of himself before the age of 30 and then got progressively larger as the years passed.

Alex is pretty close to the end of his career, 36 years old and has a lot of miles in combat sports on him. I think some of you guys must not exercise at all if you think he's going to build 20+ pounds of muscle at his age and carry the weight well in the cage.

 

[GoWokeGoBroke]

Gane is good at avoiding power while scoring with his own strikes. And he wouldn't have to worry about being taken down.

Same thing was said when facing Francis

Take nothing for granted in this “sport”

 

[BoxerMaurits]

View attachment 1016898

I know the weight cut played a role, but if you're getting slumped like that by a middleweight who was barely 200 lbs in the cage you're definitely getting slumped by Gane who's more agile than 99% of heavyweights & weighing in at 250 lbs.

You might be right, but there really is more context to a knockout like that.

Also, everybody can get knocked out by a perfect combination he doesn’t see coming. Obviously weight plays a big role, but there’re examples out there where a lighter fighter knocks the soul out of a big heavyweight, and there’re also been fights where a small guy takes huge punch of a heavyweight and keeps coming forward like nothing happened.

Long story short: You can not just use the picture of that single (and btw only time Poatan got sparked in his career) knockout-loss and go out there and say he would definitely get knocked out again. He might get knocked out yeah, but not because he got slept by “just” Izzy.
I believe there’s a greater story behind a knockout.

Anyways, I’m going to sleep now, need to wake up early for work.
Enjoy the rest of your day in Canada

 

[Safton]

@Safton thoughts on this?
I remember reading a very detailed write-up from you on how Pereira vs Gane could go (not too long ago, in a thread about that potential matchup)

I get that Alex is getting up there in age, came late to the game, and wants to cement his legacy while he can... but I wouldn't want to see this until he's either dethroned at 205 or has successfully defended his strap at least two or three times. I think any sitting champ should have to defend against two or three different contenders before any talk of "Superfights" materializes, personally. Also not much point in talking about it yet given that the Heavyweight title picture is a mess right now.

That being said, yeah here are two posts where I talked about this match-up:

Gane has a good track record against fellow kickboxers. He put on a five-round clinic against Rozenstruik and barely got touched; the only complaint people had about that fight was that it was "too boring". He also handily outstruck Volkov (a win that has aged quite well), showing a great ability to adjust mid-fight to someone trying to kill him with calf kicks which -- by his own admission -- isn't what he expected his opponent to do and thus wasn't what he trained to defend against. Got clipped one time by Tuivasa in a fight he was otherwise dominating, recovered, and put him out. Also showed great defense against the most dangerous Heavyweight calf-kicker in that fight. Gane maintains a large stable of high-caliber training partners who would be ideal in preparing him for a striker like Pereira: high-level amateur & professional boxers, Glory kickboxers, etc.

Ciryl is also the bigger man who has shown far more of a willingness to shoot takedowns, hunt subs, or just introduce a clinch-heavy gameplan on the feet if and when he feels the need. There's a good chance that he would have ~20+ pounds on Pereira on fight night. If he wants to make it dirty he absolutely can and he has shown vastly superior cardio compared to Jan at elevation.

I have no issue acknowledging that Pereira is the more credentialed kickboxer and better in that realm in a P4P sense, but in the context of "Heavyweight MMA" Ciryl's experience shutting down dangerous Heavyweight strikers across five rounds is pretty telling to me. Size matters.

Alex, while a fantastic fighter, doesn't exactly look untouchable in most of his match-ups. Gane is a massive, quick dude with good footwork and shot selection who would be able to go tit-for-tat with him in a lot of striking exchanges. Furthermore, Ciryl has a lot of experience fighting kickboxers and making them look silly.

Don't get me wrong, Pereira's accolades shit all over Gane's and I also believe that Poatan is a superior striker on a P4P basis to guys like Volkov, Rozenstruik, Tuivasa, etc. But Ciryl has so much margin for error given the size disparity. He has shot for takedowns and hunted submissions in the past and is still sharpening that particular weapon. While Poatan's defensive grappling has largely held up, it's still a work-in-progress and asking it to perform just as well against someone who would likely significantly outsize him on fight night is a big ask... especially since Gane doesn't even have to take him down per se. Bon Gamin's clinch game alone has proven to be quite punishing and he could use that to make up ground should he fall behind in the striking exchanges at distance.

I would be interested to see how Ciryl handles Alex's calf kicks, admittedly. Those could be very effective at hampering Gane's footwork, especially given his open stance. That said, Ciryl is no stranger to having guys go after his legs. Even putting aside his Muay Thai background, Volkov came in heavy with low kicks against him in Round 1. Gane by his own admission hadn't trained to prepare for that and assumed Drago would target his body instead. So after dropping the first round, Gane went back to his corner, made adjustments, and came back out to walk Alex down and out-hustle him across the next four rounds. Tuivasa has the most dangerous calf kicks at HW and also tried to target Gane with them; Ciryl defended & countered them immediately and Tai pretty much stopped committing to the legs after that. I would expect Alex to have a little more success given his utter lack of telegraph alongside his power... but I'm not sure it would be enough, especially since Ciryl can switch stances should one leg sustain damage.

I think Pereira would have a legitimate chance to make something happen, but I'd favor Gane in the fight.

Regardless, I would be open to being proven wrong and I hope to see Alex at least dip his toes in Heavyweight waters prior to the end of his career. It would be fun no matter how it ends and if he actually managed to pull it off by earning the HW strap against whoever's holding it by then we're talking legitimate P4P Combat Sports GOAT territory, lol.

 

[ricains_cretins]

Pereira looks so shy here.

 

[usernamee]

I think Gane is the most winnable fight at HW for Poatan.

If he somehow became champ again I think we would see Alex wanting to move up.

Guys like Aspinall and Jones just have ways to make the fight for Poatan really hard. Having Jones or Blaydes on top throwing elbows or 260 pound Aspinall putting all his weight on him and cranking on limbs. Not good for Poatan.

It is fucking crazy though that it is not out of the realm of possibility of Poatan becoming HW champ.

Lets say they do Gane vs Aspinall. Gane wins. Jones wins and retires.

Gane vs Poatan for a super match.

Guy has a handful of MMA fights and becomes triple champ in the fucking UFC lmao

 

[OldBoy91]

It is fucking crazy though that it is not out of the realm of possibility of Poatan becoming HW champ.

Lets say they do Gane vs Aspinall. Gane wins. Jones wins and retires.

Gane vs Poatan for a super match.

Guy has a handful of MMA fights and becomes triple champ in the fucking UFC lmao

It's kind of crazy yeah, but there are a lot of mitigating factors there that weren't and wouldn't have been there for other fighters.

He was fast tracked to both the MW and LHW title fights, without having to fight a significant grappling threat in either division on the way to becoming champ.

Then to have him fast tracked again and fight another striker at HW would be absolutely crazy.

Obviously Poatan still had to put in the work on his end and win the fights, but it would arguably be the most manufactured run in UFC history.

People talk shit about Conor and O'Malley never fighting grapplers on the way up, but would likely ignore it for Poatan because he is the new Sherdog mancrush.

 

[glenn777]

I know the weight cut played a role, but if you're getting slumped like that by a middleweight who was barely 200 lbs in the cage you're definitely getting slumped by Gane who's more agile than 99% of heavyweights & weighing in at 250 lbs.

300lb Mark Hunt got KO'd by Melvin Manhoef

 

[usernamee]

It's kind of crazy yeah, but there are a lot of mitigating factors there that weren't and wouldn't have been there for other fighters.

He was fast tracked to both the MW and LHW title fights, without having to fight a significant grappling threat in either division on the way to becoming champ.

Then to have him fast tracked again and fight another striker at HW would be absolutely crazy.

Obviously Poatan still had to put in the work on his end and win the fights, but it would arguably be the most manufactured run in UFC history.

People talk shit about Conor and O'Malley never fighting grapplers on the way up, but would likely ignore it for Poatan because he is the new Sherdog mancrush.

Yes ofc I'm agreeing with all of that. He really swooped in at the right time.

 

[AmonTobin]

Call out Jon Jones and you really will be Thanos with the infinity gauntlet.