Knee kicks in MMA.

[Xoleth]

Stipe should use them against Jones.

2025 will be a big year for HW

 

[HuskySamoan]

I have been thinking a lot about kicks to the knee and I think they're vastly underutilized in UFC and MMA in general and I'm wondering why that would be?

There are so many openings and opportunities for knee crushing kicks to the knee that I wonder why more fighters don't use them.

Even just during regular stand-up exchanges, if a person was well versed in front kicks to the knee and side kicks to the knee, they could literally just destroy an opponent with one blow if it lands properly.

Just think of grappling exchanges where a fighter is kneeing a person in the leg... that's close range enough to literally stomp all the way through a person's knee. Why isn't that done more often?

I personally think those kinds of kicks should not be legal, but they are legal and so this thread isn't about whether they should be allowed in the rules or not. This thread is genuinely questioning why they're not utilized by more fighters since they are allowed to be used and since they could end the fight so easily?

I have a pretty questionable opinion that kicks in MMA AND KICKBOXING are largely underutilized but especially in MMA since you're given so much more open space in the cage than in a ring with 4 corners. But yeah, it goes hand and hand with what you're saying kinda, guys like Adlan Amagov who had the formative kicking training, the dexterity and fast twitch muscle fibers to really kick quickly, powerfully and with diverse ranges and techniques off both legs, even the lead leg with no switch was impressive. There's now a decade+ later but not many guys in MMA or kickboxing that can do this. Amagov also threw the lead leg sidekicks to hyperextend knees before it was popular which isn't surprising in retrospect. Even utilizing rotation, I think is underexplored, miss an empty lowkick by your opponent sliding back or lifting their leg? Why not rotate through and throw a spinning hook kick off the other leg? It's the same concept as what Yan dropped Sandhagen with where he threw the lead hook and when it missed, used the momentum to spin into a backfist and then followed that rotation with another hook. Lead hook into spinning backfist into lead hook is an insane combination and it utilized rotation brilliant to set it up.

Truthfully though, the cardio requirements to be an active kicker, the footwork, he dexterity etc. It's not the most practical. The kicks to the knee to hyper extend and stop forward momentum are useful, long guys like Jones, Izzy, Pereira all use versions of this. Yoel liked it too but I think in general, lengths important.

Now the most underutilized/developed aspect of striking in MMA is striking in boxing range or even in the pocket like boxing terms, being comfortable under fire, using good blocking and trunk movement and knowing how to punch off blocks and slips and chain tight combinations together with hooks and uppercuts etc. And it makes sense this is underdeveloped because it can be so overshadowed by clinch striking and grappling which are always there once you give up range in MMA and it requires you to often be the most physical fighter to effectively impose it.