Media Fluff Train Derailed

[JonnyBonesPharmacist]

Hernandez looked like some goof they pulled out of the stands. Pathetic

 

[rear naked ankle pick]

isnt ufc material

 

[Bork Neslar]

Flabby, I mean Fluffy should drop the fat and fight at WW. Strickland looked much bigger than him.

 

[MigitAs]

Stickland was bigger, stronger, more accurate and just better. Fluffy looks like he needs to hit the weight room more. He's not going to bully good MWs as a small, flabby fighter. DDP would own him as well.

He’s a rare example in the UFC of a guy that is way more skilled than he is athletic.

 

[Steve Fox]

I'm not convinced Sean is better than him honestly.

They literally just fought man. All good, who am I to convince you of otherwise.

 

[MMASpeculator]

Was funny to see Strickland as a +250 dog against fatty. Blocking punches with your face to get the takedowns has a limited shelf life.

 

[dubhlinn]

8 fight win streak with 6 finishes. he loses 1 fight and people shitting on him? stop it, get some help.

 

[TheMMAnalyst]

Fluffy went 8-1 and lost to a bad style matchup against a recent world champion.

There are so many brain dead takes around this. Styles make fights.

The memory of a gold fish.

8-1 against whom? His list of wins is a bunch of respectable journeymen, he has no "elite" wins outside of Brendan Allen (whom is also kind of just a respected journeyman in many ways).

I'm a key proponent of "styles makes fights" as a way to hyper-analyze match-ups, so yes Fluffy is going to have major issues with anyone that can out-fight/counter-wrestle/attacks the body consistently. Since this is MW there is a shortage of out-fighters, wrestlers, and guys that attack the body regularly.

All I'm saying (and many whom agree with me) is that he never proved his style actually worked against the best of the division, so it seemed people were prematurely calling him "unstoppable" or expecting him to be an elite killing machine when he doesn't have elite wins.

It doesn't mean he still isn't a very good fighter for the division, just clearly a very flawed fighter with some critical holes to exploit.

 

[Huge Toad]

Hernandez looked like some goof they pulled out of the stands. Pathetic

 

[Lionheart7167]

Let's be honest.
Fluff looked like a "barely top 15 in 2009" in that fight.
He has a ton of holes and that performance convinced me he'll never be top 5

 

[snugglecakes]

Allen just beat the absolute shit out of a surging opponent and has a very high quality UFC record.

who did he beat? Fringe top 10 RDR or non top 15 Starven Marven? How does beating rank 8-15 land you at rank 5?

 

[rjmbrd]

who did he beat? Fringe top 10 RDR or non top 15 Starven Marven? How does beating rank 8-15 land you at rank 5?

He's been in the UFC for a decade with an overwhelmingly winning record and only lost to high quality, name brand fighters.

Yes that is exactly how you get ranked. RDR being "fringe" is pointedly stupid. Beating Whittaker as your 3rd consecutive UFC win after coming over as multi-division champion from another org is solidly ranked.

The amount of bozo takes around here is hilarious. There likely isn't more than 10 middleweights on planet earth that can beat Fluffy or Allen. That is quite literally why they have winning records in the big leagues and rarely lose.

 

[PaulieVegas27]

I don't know if it's been "derailed" but certainly a giant dent has been put in it. People said the same thing about Ngannou after the Derek Lewis fight and that turned out not to be a case. Same with then Aljamain Sterling lost to Brian Carraway and now a lot of people consider him a GOAT candidate at FW. I think Fluffy will be fine in the long run.

 

[Safton]

He didn't have the explosive power needed to make Strickland tentative.

That's my take, too. I narrowly favored Hernandez going in. I was mildly surprised by how much Strickland's footwork was able to flummox Hernandez and also by how little success Ant had with his offensive grappling.

In hindsight I don't think being a nominal "pressure fighter" alone cuts it against Strickland. If you look at the common denominator amongst his losses, they were all freak athletes that were big for the weight class with power in their strikes. All were willing to stalk him down while showing little respect for what was coming back in their direction. Cannonier, DDP, Pereira. Hell, even Abus in the first round had Sean on the back foot playing defense the entire time against his dangerous kicks and offensive grappling game... until he adrenaline-dumped and became a sitting duck.

Anthony doesn't really fit that mold. He's simultaneously chubby yet undersized at Middleweight. He's not particularly athletic or explosive. A bit pillow-fisted. He's a solid enough technical wrestler by Middleweight standards, but really relies on grinding guys out rather than having well-timed blast doubles with tons of drive behind them. He actually ended up repeatedly in the body-lock position against Strickland rather than aggressively pursuing the double-leg. Attacking Sean on the upper-body or by reaching down for lazy shots is the worst possible way to wrestle him. He has really good defenses for that. You need an explosive double-leg entry or perhaps some kind of opportunistic Judo-style trip to get him down... though keeping him down is another story all together.

 

[pātrēärkē]

Dude this is why people don't test Strickland. Paulo Costa who's a forward destroyer did nothing but backpedal against Sean.

i get it people make fun of his lack of power but try stand in the pocket with a guy who can hit you and you can't hit him. It's a lot different than people think.

Paulo hasn't been a foward destroyer since the izzy fight

 

[Lou Duva]

Fluffy's coach said at the end of the first round "good job fighting at the slower pace".

It's obvious that his coaches are incompetent and devised a gameplan that was centered around mitigating the risk of Fluffy gassing, instead of just backing him in to do what he had done successfully for years.

If you think Fluffy only managed 1 takedown attempt in 12.5 minutes just because Strickland was "too good" then you are only observing this sport on a superficial level.

He had attempted 17 takedowns by that point in the fight against Michel Pereira - yes, a much shitter fighter, but a more explosive athlete who is just as hard to get into shooting distance on.

Fluffy fought with no intensity vs Strickland, he abandoned the thing that has brought him a massive amount of success over the last few years: crazy pace.

He is nothing but an average fighter with average striking without it, and that is exactly the result he got thanks to he and his coaches failure to back himself in to fight to his strengths and not worry about what would happen if it didn't work.

Yeah but if that dumb game plan doesn’t work you gotta adjust if you’re fluffy that’s on him , the elite guys adjust what they’re doin if the other guy has something working on him

 

[snugglecakes]

He's been in the UFC for a decade with an overwhelmingly winning record and only lost to high quality, name brand fighters.

Yes that is exactly how you get ranked. RDR being "fringe" is pointedly stupid. Beating Whittaker as your 3rd consecutive UFC win after coming over as multi-division champion from another org is solidly ranked.

The amount of bozo takes around here is hilarious. There likely isn't more than 10 middleweights on planet earth that can beat Fluffy or Allen. That is quite literally why they have winning records in the big leagues and rarely lose.

why couldn't you just answer my very simple question the first time with the simple answer of "Allen beat RDR who became top 5 via split decisioning beating (the rapidly declining) robert and Fluffy beat allen and that is how 2 people became over ranked. It was a very simple question looking for a simple answer. Why couldn't you just answer it simply the first time instead of making a bug fuss about it?

Anyway, that's just naturally what happens with a top 5 guy is on the very rapid decline, multiple people may become over ranked as a chain reaction before the dust settles... like when career gatekeeper crusher nick diaz became ranked in the UFC for a hot minute off beating BJ who was 9001 ranks higher than he should have been at the time, we just didn't know it yet (well some of us knew)

 

[rjmbrd]

why couldn't you just answer my very simple question the first time with the simple answer of "Allen beat RDR who became top 5 via split decisioning beating (the rapidly declining) robert and Fluffy beat allen and that is how 2 people became over ranked.

WTF gobbly gook writing is this?

I presumed a little bit of common sense on your end. Allen beating a ranked RDR is how he got ranked. This should not need to be explained.

Anyway, that's just naturally what happens with a top 5 guy is on the very rapid decline, multiple people may become over ranked as a chain reaction before the dust settles... like when career gatekeeper crusher nick diaz became ranked in the UFC for a hot minute off beating BJ who was 9001 ranks higher than he should have been at the time, we just didn't know it yet (well some of us knew)

This isn't a therapy session.

Look at the total roster depth under contract at middleweight.

You are a complete bozo if you don't think both Allen and Fluffy are top 10 in the division.

 

[snugglecakes]

WTF gobbly gook writing is this?

I presumed a little bit of common sense on your end. Allen beating a ranked RDR is how he got ranked. This should not need to be explained.





This isn't a therapy session.

Look at the total roster depth under contract at middleweight.

You are a complete bozo if you don't think both Allen and Fluffy are top 10 in the division.

this entire chain reaction of people being this over ranked all originated from RDR split decisioning the very rapidly declining now rank 8 Whittiker. It's literally the difference of 1 single scorecard and these people would all not be top 5. RDR diffs Robert by 1 judge, takes his top 5 spot, then Brenden beats RDR and claims his spot while bringing fluffy along with him. Fluffy and brenden were both rank 9 and 10 at the time of their fight & fluffy and Dolidze were also 9 and 10 at the time of their fight and that was Fluffy's last win. He somehow went from from rank 9 to 4 by beating rank 10 in his last win, all cause robert lost 1 single scorecard.

You are the bozo if u can't see why these rankings make zero sense. Fluffy literally went from rank 9 to 4 without even fighting. He has a grand total of zero top 5 wins


in other words, they jumped him from rank 9 to 4 when his last win was against rank 10, all just to create hype and sell more.

I am hardly the first person to point out that UFC rankings are based off marketing more than merit. They just put Izzy back in the top 5 and he hasn't won in nearly 3 years. You bet your ass it's because he has a fight coming up.