Font Vs Aldo: Post Fight-Day Thoughts

[Zebra Cheeks]

As a lot of you know I’m a huge Font fan. Last night was a tough one, but I’d like to give some thoughts.

I have to say that I think font came in light (weight) with the intention of pushing the pace and making Aldo work hard and accumulate damages. It was the max Holloway game plan. Which makes sense, Aldo lost to Holloway twice I believe. And his cardio was a vulnerability. But Aldo made adjustments and because he was ahead he used grappling and large meaningful actions to shut down font.

There was a key moment, I believe it was the end of the third. Aldo had a broken orbital (it seems), his leg was bothering him from kicking (he was holding it and massaging it before sitting down to get water, used almost half his corner time), and he looked exhausted. Font comes out of the corner and it’s obvious, round 4 is the round he was saving for, and he knows he’s behind. He gets too close, compromised his defense and Aldo once again knocked his ass down and smothered him knowing he was firmly and safely ahead on the cards due to multiple knockdowns.

I have to say, I think that key moment, had that gone differently the fight trajectory would look massively different. But instead of this being a story of a rising new face in a stacked division, it was a story about Aldo.

What made Aldo’s performance so great was that it monumentalizes why, after 17 years he’s still one of the best. Aldo learned from his losses to Holloway, and when someone came with a similar game plan, he wasn’t just ready, he had been waiting, starving for the opportunity to show he could dominate given the opportunity. This was a very dangerous Jose Aldo, and this fight, despite being a less prestigious opponent, meant a lot to him because of the way it was fought.

I think font will bounce back, and I genuinely hope we get to see TJ vs Aldo. Man, that’s one hell of a fight.

 

[fortheo]

I'm a huge Font fan as well man, as you know. He needed to feint more to give Aldo more to think about and make Aldo second guess in order to prevent Aldo from getting his timing down. Font did do a lot of good work, and I really liked his body shots, and I did think the basis of his gameplan (present aldo with several different looks, try to bury Aldo in volume, and clinch with Aldo to wear on him) was a good gameplan, but he just needed to be a little more tricky with more feints to throw off the rhythym and mess up Aldo's reads. Aldo was just better as much as that hurts me to say, but the fact that Font has become as good as he is despite not doing any martial arts training until he was like 21 is pretty insane. Font and his team should be proud of that performance even though he lost, very few people have brought the fight to Aldo like that before.

Unfortunately for Font, he's not a young guy. He's in his prime right now and probably has another good 2 years at best in it. Any improvements he can make in that time are going to be minor ones and tactical ones, and those will of course help him; but I think we've pretty much seen his ceiling and it's as a top 5 guy and that's nothing to be ashamed of. I'd love for him to prove me wrong, but time just isn't on his side. He'll still likely pick up a few damn impressive wins though and I hope he gets paid because he goes for it every time.

 

[Shay Brennan]

It's amazing that he has to restrain himself from kicking because he kicks so damn hard.

 

[Fossor]

Just shows how good Yan is.
Also lately I have a strong feeling that TJ, Cruz and Cody were always overrated.

 

[Macaque]

I wonder what kind of injury he has on his leg. His corner was practically begging him for 3 rounds so he’d kick and he refused to. Saying like, “Please José, I need at least one just so he thinks about it”.

Must be something rough for him to refuse to do it.

 

[iwantgsp]

font is weak. he hits Aldo like 10 times, and then gets hit once, immediately gets rocked. The power difference was huge.

 

[Bakayoko]

I think there were 3 moments where Aldo won the fight.End of R1-Font was winning the round then got clipped hard,seemed like it took his wind off from that moment.R3-shooting for a takedown and ending on his back(why?).And the one in round 4 you mentioned.

 

[Iron Nick]

font is weak. he hits Aldo like 10 times, and then gets hit once, immediately gets rocked. The power difference was huge.

Nah, that's not true.
It's just that also slipped and rolled with shots so well that Font had a lot of trouble landing anything flush where the power wasn't taken away by Aldo rolling with the strike.

 

[Zebra Cheeks]

Just shows how good Yan is.
Also lately I have a strong feeling that TJ, Cruz and Cody were always overrated.

I will say I agree in regards to Cody. I never thought he was great though. He’s too reckless. People viewed him as a top tier contender, I viewed him as more of a…Jeremy stephens? Type of guy? You know, like lots of power but no game plan and not that well rounded.

It's amazing that he has to restrain himself from kicking because he kicks so damn hard.

I wonder what kind of injury he has on his leg. His corner was practically begging him for 3 rounds so he’d kick and he refused to. Saying like, “Please José, I need at least one just so he thinks about it”.

Must be something rough for him to refuse to do it.

My understanding is that Aldo was involved in a motorcycle accident that compromised his leg. Now, to what extent I have no idea, and this was years ago…. I think it Aldo still had the health of his legs he’d have been able to beat yan. That’s why I freaked out during the yan fight when he let the legs go and started kicking. He was risking his career, his health, everything to try and get that win. It’s a matter of risk management at this point, I believe

 

[Zebra Cheeks]

font is weak. he hits Aldo like 10 times, and then gets hit once, immediately gets rocked. The power difference was huge.

It’s not a power difference it was the type of strikes being thrown, but yes, Aldo hits very hard

 

[Question]

Once Font is recovered, I could see him taking on Merab or Sandhagen.
Aldo really impressed with how he paced himself last night too, him dropping Font the way he did suprised me.
Great fight!
Also great post!

 

[Zebra Cheeks]

I'm a huge Font fan as well man, as you know. He needed to feint more to give Aldo more to think about and make Aldo second guess in order to prevent Aldo from getting his timing down. Font did do a lot of good work, and I really liked his body shots, and I did think the basis of his gameplan (present aldo with several different looks, try to bury Aldo in volume, and clinch with Aldo to wear on him) was a good gameplan, but he just needed to be a little more tricky with more feints to throw off the rhythym and mess up Aldo's reads. Aldo was just better as much as that hurts me to say, but the fact that Font has become as good as he is despite not doing any martial arts training until he was like 21 is pretty insane. Font and his team should be proud of that performance even though he lost, very few people have brought the fight to Aldo like that before.

Unfortunately for Font, he's not a young guy. He's in his prime right now and probably has another good 2 years at best in it. Any improvements he can make in that time are going to be minor ones and tactical ones, and those will of course help him; but I think we've pretty much seen his ceiling and it's as a top 5 guy and that's nothing to be ashamed of. I'd love for him to prove me wrong, but time just isn't on his side. He'll still likely pick up a few damn impressive wins though and I hope he gets paid because he goes for it every time.

Fortheo your pulling at my heart strings bud.

My only optimism comes from font having started so late, maybe he’ll get more mileage out of his career than others due to picking it up a bit later. Either way, I intend to watch him till the day he retires

 

[Jozo Sha]

Great thread. I thought Font had this as well, but Aldo proved that experience and adapting to your opponent will often win the day, even if you've been written off as a has-been fighter.
Impressive performance by Jose and he deserved this win.

 

[Reach4theSky]

I know this has been said at nauseam, but if Aldo was in someway able to start mixing in those leg kicks on a more frequent basis he could honestly contend and possibly win another title. We saw it last night, as soon as Aldo threw a few leg kicks on Font the whole trajectory of the fight changed..

Jose is an elite leg kicker he really needs to make that a more regular attack in is arsenal..

 

[Fossor]

I will say I agree in regards to Cody. I never thought he was great though. He’s too reckless. People viewed him as a top tier contender, I viewed him as more of a…Jeremy stephens? Type of guy? You know, like lots of power but no game plan and not that well rounded.

But Cody clowned Cruz, it was a brilliant performace. Then Cejudo kicked both TJ's and Cruz' arses. Corey was also close to finishing Dillashaw.

 

[Zebra Cheeks]

But Cody clowned Cruz, it was a brilliant performace. Then Cejudo kicked both TJ's and Cruz' arses. Corey was also close to finishing Dillashaw.

The difficulty with Cruz is he’s one of those guys who’s stayed around for too long for sure, and his history of injuries and health issues has made it exceptionally hard for me to determine what’s due to digressing, and what’s due to “was he ever that good”. On top of that you’ve got TJ who was yolked to the gills on god knows what at any given time, so who knows how that impacted everything

 

[HatKick]

Aldo reminded me of Yan in there. Taking his time, rolling with shots, waiting for the right moment, then BOOM!

Font had the right game plan. When he came out and started working the body and took Aldo down (kinda) I thought, Damn he's doing exactly what he needs to do. But like you said Aldo was mentally prepared for that kind of fight. Crazy how he hurt Font with everything that landed. I like Font but it was almost comical how many times he got dropped/wobbled

It's always happy times when Aldo wins.

 

[fortheo]

Fortheo your pulling at my heart strings bud.

My only optimism comes from font having started so late, maybe he’ll get more mileage out of his career than others due to picking it up a bit later. Either way, I intend to watch him till the day he retires

It's just me trying to level out my hopes by keeping it real. One thing about Font is that he's a true student of the game and he definitely will make some adjustments. He's not done and I expect him to put another run together and it will be fun. I'm looking forward to hearing him and his coaches talk about what they learned from this one in the future.

 

[Zebra Cheeks]

It's just me trying to level out my hopes by keeping it real. One thing about Font is that he's a true student of the game and he definitely will make some adjustments. He's not doneand I expect him to put another run together and it will be fun. I'm looking forward to hearing him and his coaches talk about what they learned from this one in the future.

For sure. I think there’s a little something in the tank. I’m not making any promises but he doesn’t look “done” to me.

I think a fight like this has the potential to be a really positive loss for a lot of guys, but that’s on rob and his team and how they choose to move forward from this

 

[fortheo]

For sure. I think there’s a little something in the tank. I’m not making any promises but he doesn’t look “done” to me.

I think a fight like this has the potential to be a really positive loss for a lot of guys, but that’s on rob and his team and how they choose to move forward from this

Definitely not done. I still want to figure out why Font looked thin and drained for this one. It could be because he was looking to implement a cardio based game as you mentioned, but I don't know. I don't like how lean he looked and I noticed it before the fight even happened. I thought his face still looked kind of sunk in and vulnerable from the cut to be honest. That's kind of a moot point though and I don't think it had much of anything to do with the loss, but I really am curious about it because he did look noticeable different to me.