If reach doesn't matter, explain Tim Sylvia

[MCS]

So Sylvia is great now? Because he wasn't thought to be all that when he was doing well. Lost and beat AA, beat Monson and Ricco, lost to Randy, Fedor and Nog. I can't believe people thought he'd beat Chuck or Randy. Just awful technique with some basic understanding of distance.

 

[Phisher]

No, it takes Jones fans for the millionth time pointing to Struve any time you mention reach.

Point to Struve or call you racist, you know one of those is coming.

Typically, we don't just point to Struve in this these reach arguments. There's also Diabate, McGee, McCrory, Schilt (in MMA), Hornbuckle, Garza, Watson, Delgado, Roop, Barnatt, and pretty much every other lanky guy in the sport that isn't named Jones or Gustafsson.

Reach is an advantage (if a fighter is capable of using it correctly), but being long is also a huge disadvantage when it comes to grappling. That's the main point that Jones fans like me try to make. That and the fact that you don't see fans constantly whining about any other physical attribute that yields advantage in MMA.


And RE Sylvia, he isn't proof of anything. He looked his best when he was roided to the gills and almost all of the real talent in his division was in Pride. The fact that he was embarrassed so badly by an undersized, aged Couture should put any talk about his physical advantages or the seriousness of the UFC HW division at that time as a competitive entity to rest.

 

[Loiosh]

Typically, we don't just point to Struve in this these reach arguments. There's also Diabate, McGee, McCrory, Schilt (in MMA), Hornbuckle, Garza, Watson, Delgado, Roop, Barnatt, and pretty much every other lanky guy in the sport that isn't named Jones or Gustafsson.

Reach is an advantage (if a fighter is capable of using it correctly), but being long is also a huge disadvantage when it comes to grappling. That's the main point that Jones fans like me try to make. That and the fact that you don't see fans constantly whining about any other physical attribute that yields advantage in MMA.


And RE Sylvia, he isn't proof of anything. He looked his best when he was roided to the gills and almost all of the real talent in his division was in Pride. The fact that he was embarrassed so badly by an undersized, aged Couture should put any talk about his physical advantages or the seriousness of the UFC HW division at that time as a competitive entity to rest.

I'm not going to get into this again; I've heard all these arguments before and they're all terrible.

Reach is an enormous advantage in MMA, and most dominant champions have had a significant reach advantage.

 

[GabbaGabba]

reach always matters. Even if you are Mike Tyson KO'ing bigger guys, still the reach matters and makes it harder.

 

[PivotPunch]

Power and strength are the last things to go only very very few fighters hang around long enough for it to happen.

 

[>>jonutarr>]

Ah the good old days when the UFC heavyweight champ was an unbeatable force ranked 8th in the world.

..and calling out Pride fighters, then got smashed by the GOAT in under 30secs

 

[Deleted member 196663]

If Jones didn't have a 84" inch wingspan and DC didn't have a 71" inch reach it would be a very different fight. Even though DC has a great chance at beating Jones and I think he could beat Cain and rule the HW division, I don't see him winning tomorrow. I think because of his reach disadvantage, you will see DC lose this fight to Jones via decision. If they had the same reach, I think DC would be taking this fight. That's how important reach is.

Since Jones has a 13" reach advantage and is a versatile, smooth, and creative striker he will be able to keep DC at bay when he wants to and will be able to bring him in close to clinch or TD when he wants to also. Reach will be the key to this fight.


I think so many people under-estimate how important reach is. I believe reach is the greatest physical asset you can have because it never deteriorates with age like all of the other skills and it can be improved upon with skill.



Speed, great chin, strength, reflexes, power, and all of the other natural born assets that fighters can have diminish with age. Your chin doesn't get better with age and especially as you take hits, your strength reaches a plateau and at a certain age you just will never be as strong as you once were, reflexes and power eventually go down, but reach doesn't diminish with age. Look at the greats like Anderson and Fedor, eventually father time caught up with them and they suffered.


If you have a great jab you can really do quite a lot with it. Keep strikers at bay, keep wrestlers too far away for TD's, it can make your elbows vertical or horizontal far more deadly, and many other things.

Take Jessamyn Duke for example, a perfect example of how not to utilize your reach advantage. Instead of pumping a good jab and then using her combos and powershots she gets in close and beat up.

Then look at Tim Sylvia. Not a great athlete, not super powerful, or fast, or extremely skilled, but he had a great jab that he would keep opponents at bay with and eventually his hits would add up and he could add a more powerful strike, hurting his opponents. You could say his opponents at the time were weak, but he still did great while not being a great athlete himself. All because of his reach.


So, if you think reach isn't one of the greatest assets a fighter can have, you are wrong. It really is one of the greatest assets you can have, especially since you can build off of it to make it deadly and it doesn't deteriorate with age like all other physical attributes.

You clearly don't know enough about the fight game to make absolute statements like that. It's hard for even pro-trainers to say things like that.

 

[RepairManManMan]

Timmy hate is disgusting. He is supposedly not that good yet his leftovers are still in the top 10. If sylvia had reach that was about the only advantage he had.

People using Mike Tyson as an example that reach doesnt matter is dumb. Boxing isn't MMA. What Mike Tyson was able to do in boxing wouldn't work in MMA for numerous reasons. Do you think trying to get in close like that in an MMA fight and trying to head weave like that wouldnt get you either KTFO by a knee or taken down?

That's assuming that every fighter could just land a knee perfectly whenever they want. They can't. I don't know how weaving would make it easier for the taller fighter to get a takedown.

In boxing weaving puts you at a disadvantage against uppercuts. It's been proven time and time again. Foreman over Frazier, Douglas over Tyson.

 

[kaya]

Make fun of Tim all you want.

He smashed Ricco, who EASILY beat Big Nog during Big Nog's prime (judging robbery)

*shrug*

 

[RepairManManMan]

Make fun of Tim all you want.

He smashed Ricco, who EASILY beat Big Nog during Big Nog's prime (judging robbery)

*shrug*

ricco had a destructive run before running into tim.

and overall, a very good mma career. He could have easily been top 10 few years ago still.

 

[tasticles]

Silvia used straight punches and countered well.
Not everyone with reach does that, Jones primarily being one of them. He's normally not a counter a puncher, sans the machida fight, and his footwork is horrible.

He wins because he's fucking good at fighting. End of story.

This. It's only an asset if the user is any good with it. If it made it that easy every lanky dude on earth would be a professional boxer. How is it only the klitsko brothers and lennox lewis have made great use of their reach?

 

[synyster]

Tim was one of the best of all time at heavy dont let the fickle fans tell you otherwise

 

[RepairManManMan]

This. It's only an asset if the user is any good with it. If it made it that easy every lanky dude on earth would be a professional boxer. How is it only the klitsko brothers and lennox lewis have made great use of their reach?

one one one one

one one one

one one

one two.


Reach has a huge mental advantage attached to it. If you are constantly on gaurd or aware of being popped you become tentative and just allow yourself to be popped by jabs and straights all day. Klitchko is a prime example of this.

However, in boxing, Tyson, Frazier, Marciano, Dempsey, and Joe Louis never had a reach advantage.

 

[RepairManManMan]

Tim was one of the best of all time at heavy dont let the fickle fans tell you otherwise

I hate to say this, but sometimes I feel it's because tim didn't physically fit the part. Like, I don't want to use any words people might think is hate speech, but...ya know what I mean?

 

[ButterStoch]

Reach matters. That was the conclusion from analyzing 1000+ fights in the book Fightnomics. It's not about Jones or Sylvia. I remember an interview & the author of the book studied this.

The conclusion was that reach was a correlated with a greater chance of victory, while height was not. It doesnt mean that everyone with reach beats everyone with less reach, but that it increases the odds of victory.

 

[Panacci]

I think so many people under-estimate how important reach is. I believe reach is the greatest physical asset you can have because it never deteriorates with age like all of the other skills and it can be improved upon with skill.


[/B]

reach doesn't deteriorate with age, but speed, reflexes, power and timing do, so those factors can change the effectiveness of reach. So it's not a guaranteed advantage/constant. Also, relying on anything too heavily can be a weakness if exploited.

 

[dexgod]

Heh, i laughed just by looking at the title. It makes sense.

 

[SnowBlynd]

On sherdog the reach advantage is not an advantage

 

[MuddyFugger]

HAHAHA!

Where is Sylvia with his long reach now? He ruled when there was limited talent... just like Chuck... yup, I said it

 

[panamaican]

I truly don't understand the people that claim that reach isn't a huge advantage. The simple ability to hit your opponent before they are in position to hit you is an advantage that just can't be minimized. The ability to control the range of the fight purely based on a physical gift is a great thing to bring to a fight.

Can fighters overcome a reach disadvantage? Yes. But it is still a disadvantage. You can be a great fighter without the reach advantage but it requires learning how to overcome the reach advantage of your opponent.