News Marcin Vettori Vs Brendan Allen main event - April 6th

[StonedLemur]

Allen is better everywhere except for his chin. Allen easy unless he gets caught.

Luckily for Allen Vettori swings bitch mittens lol.

If he were a real orc his ax would be made of foam rubber lmao.

 

[StonedLemur]

Good fight! Not really sure who to pick?

Flip a coin on this one sir.

 

[Herwald]

I see they cut the shorts off in the pics to spare vettori the embarrassment this time

To go from Italian to Polish, it was a necessary step in his metamorphosis.

 

[StonedLemur]

I got Vettori in this one. He's hard to wrestle so you need to be extremely technical and evasive on the feet to beat him, otherwise he smothers you with his granite chin.

In the past 8 years he's only lost to Rob, Adesanya and Cannonier.

Cannonier might not fit the evasive/technical profile as much as the other 2, but he has power.

I don't see Allen as evasive nor as a big power guy.

Recency bias is clouding people'a judgement

I like Allen but I think you might be right.
This a 50/50 fight at best, with Vettoris chin giving a small percentage over Allen.

I don't seeing Allen having the weapons necessary to deal with the pressure bit I could be wrong sir.

 

[Safton]

I got Vettori in this one. He's hard to wrestle so you need to be extremely technical and evasive on the feet to beat him, otherwise he smothers you with his granite chin.

In the past 8 years he's only lost to Rob, Adesanya and Cannonier.

Cannonier might not fit the evasive/technical profile as much as the other 2, but he has power.

I don't see Allen as evasive nor as a big power guy.

Recency bias is clouding people'a judgement

I don't think it's recency bias to pick Allen, though it would be recency bias to say that Vettori has no path to victory against him.

I personally would be more receptive to the "He has only looked bad against elite guys" argument if he hadn't looked so goddamn lackluster against Dolidze. I thought Roman was a good match-up for Marvin, but he looked very stiff and flat in that fight and came within a hair's breadth of losing it. Roman is great fun to watch and very dangerous when he's allowed to ply his trade... but he's a very limited fighter.

@Safton

I like this match making. It's a step up for Allen, but not a huge one and it's a decent stylistic match up that doesn't present the huge immediate dangers that some other fighters could give allen. What I mean by that is that vettori is neither a huge power puncher nor is he a big submission threat. Perhaps what I see as Allen's biggest weakness (striking defence) won't be as big of a factor in this fight. That said, I can see vettori edging the striking and mixing a few very short lived takedowns on uis way to taking a decision. Tough fight to predict, but that's my initial reaction.

Good fight.

Finally, the UFC gives me some matchmaking I can get behind. I think this is the perfect fight to make for both men considering where they're at in their careers:

1. A lot of people were calling for Allen to fight someone like Chimaev or Dolidze… IMO that's a small forward against two dangerous opponents. He deserves more of a bump. Yes, he got gifted his shot into the rankings against Muniz by virtue of everyone ducking Andre. But since then he has defended that rank twice: first against an unranked Bruno Silva and then against Paul Craig, both of which are finishers who could have easily derailed his momentum. Instead he stopped both and added to an impressive streak. In light of this you should let him have a Top 5ish guy, IMO.
2. Marvin Vettori clearly desperately needs a step down in competition. I think it has been proven to our satisfaction by this point given his fights with Izzy, Whittaker, and Cannonier that he is not quite elite. He is well above the riff raff, but well below the peak of the Middleweight mountain on the fringe. He has taken a lot of damage lately and hasn't convincingly or impressively won a fight since he beat Paulo Costa. A fight against an up-and-comer in Allen shows us where he's at.

Stylistically, Vettori is a fairly well-rounded generalist who isn't afraid to test most areas of any given opponent's game. He is also seemingly impossible to finish, having never been knocked down (much less KO'd) or submitted. Allen is very much a consummate finisher who rarely goes to Decision, so if he is the first to finish Marvin it would be a massive feather in his cap. Marvin also has proven cardio to fight at a steady pace for at least four rounds (not always a full five, he tends to take one off a bit). This being a Main Event means we might see Allen's cardio get taxed if Vettori survives, which he is wont to do, and drags Brendan late into the bout. That is important because Brendan has gassed before.

In the grappling department, it's hard to call. I could see Allen potentially scoring a brief takedown or two on Vettori, but I don't see him managing to hold him down for long at all. Vettori's TDD is pretty good. I know Jared took him down several times, but even with Marvin hurt he continuously scrambled to his feet within like 30ish seconds each time and Cannonier's wrestling has massively improved. Allen, on the other hand, is not an elite wrestler by his own admission. I think Allen is definitely the better finisher on the mat, though.

Now as for Vettori pursuing takedowns on him… it's weird because I used to think of Marvin as a sort of generalist with a heavy wrestling lean. I know Mark Munoz was his long-time wrestling coach at Kings and they had good things to say about his drive on the mats over there. But when was the last time he really fought with offensive grappling as the cornerstone of his gameplan? The Holland fight and the Izzy rematch? He totally out-hustled Kevin, but that's really not all that surprising given the short-notice nature of the bout and the massive gaping hole in Holland's skill set at the time. The Adesanya rematch was what it was. Granted I think Marvin is sometimes unfairly maligned for his performance in that fight; people talk like he got beat up from bell-to-bell when in fact Izzy played it smart and out-pointed him from the outside. Despite that, Vettori had legitimate moments of success wherein he took Israel down and threatened submissions.

But that was two and a half years ago. Since then we just haven't seen any sort of wrestling pace from him. Costa arguably won their grappling exchanges while Whittaker and Cannonier definitely did. Despite training at Xtreme Couture, he seems to want to be more of a kickboxer these days. Now if he did reintroduce the threat of the takedown into his game, that might very well help against Allen… might. I've said before that Brendan overperforms against BJJ guys but struggles badly against wrestlers. Vettori using takedowns as ways to disrupt Allen's momentum or put the stamp on a round late after striking for most of it rather than seeking a protracted grappling exchange might work. I have no idea if he could successfully post up on top of Brendan for any length of time without getting swept, though.

So that leaves the striking. Vettori has such weird ebbs and flows in his stand-up. In one fight he looks like the most pillow-fisted guy on the Middleweight roster and seriously lacking in stand-up acumen. In other fights he sits down on a punch out of nowhere and shows sneaky power to hurt dudes when I least expect it: he shattered Hermansson's orbital and dropped him badly, wobbled Jared multiple times in Round 1, etc. He also occasionally shows more technique than I traditionally give him credit for. That said… he looked incredibly vulnerable against Whittaker, Cannonier, and worst of all Dolidze. Whittaker's really good, so whatever. The limited success he had in the Jared fight was almost all due to Cannonier making mistakes: playing around in southpaw, blitzing in to try and finish and occasionally eating counters, etc. But I can't forget that fight against Roman; you really shouldn't be taking Dolidze to a contentious Split Decision in a striking match where he is lobbing sloppy overhands at you while you kick his legs over and over.

Allen has a lot of issues surrounding his durability and striking defense (dude doesn't move his head at all, especially during his entries or after throwing his combinations), but offensively he is fairly competent. You can see the work Hooft has put in with him. He has a killer straight right, a good check left hook, and a very solid round kick to the body. I think the latter will be very important here as Costa showed that Vettori is particularly vulnerable to that weapon.

I admit I am not sure how this one will end. I think this current version of Brendan has the chops to beat Vettori if he fights smart. He just needs to manage his distance, throw his combinations, and look for any opportunities to get the fight to the mat… all without disrespecting Vettori's perceived lack of power. Marvin can crack on occasion and Brendan can get rocked by literally anyone. He also needs to keep his gas tank in check. If I'm forced to make a pick, I'll say a UD for Allen. Mixture of 48-47s and 49-46 scorecards. I expect him to take the first few rounds with his power, shot selection, speed, and by winning any scrambles on the mat. Vettori might get staggered or put in submission danger at some point, but he'll survive and start to take over late as Brendan's overconfidence leads to him getting gassed and/or hurt. Marvin tags him up a bit in the pocket, puts him on wobbly legs at least once, maybe takes him down and roughs him up a bit… but it's too little, too late. That's how I see it anyway.

 

[The_Renaissance]

Hmmmm. I think the Allen train stops here. I don't see him taking Vettori down, the guy's a brick wall. I wouldn't be surprised if Marvin gets a rare finish here, Allen is chinny and with it being 5 rounds where he's unable to grapple really, his chin is there for the taking - Vettori has proven he can go into deep waters, Allen hasn't.

Vettori - TKO, 4th round.

 

[Shadey1]

This is a good fight. Solid test for Allen. Personally though I see Vettori taking this one.

 

[PEDRO IVO RUSSO MIRANDA]

When i read Marcin Vettori I've been expecting some Vettori+ Prachnio fused

 

[Snake989]

Marcin Vettori via heel hook

 

[Goldentrophy]

crazy how Vettori's stocks are still high after the life beating he got from Cannonier

That legendary chin of his, it'll be interesting to see if/when that chin cracks.

 

[OldBoy91]

Well, Marvin is not exactly an Italian name either, so…

It's Welsh and he's a ginger so it still checks out.

 

[Eternalwarriorking]

My first instinct is absolutely to favor Allen here.

I think Allen has so many potential ways to win this fight, but in addition to a chin inferior to Marvin's legendary titanium jaw, he also has a tendency to get hit in the pocket a bit. While Marvin is by no means a big hitter, this dynamic has benefitted him greatly in the past, like his fight with Jack Hermansson. Allen undoubtedly has the sharper hands, but I wonder if Marvin can wear him down in such scenarios.

Perhaps a complimentary strategy for Marvin would be using his superior size to clinch heavily and wear out him out with body-work? Strickland and Curtis both terrorized Allen with body-shots. I think this simple tactic indispensable if Marvin plans on capitalizing on a gassed Brendan Allen later in the fight.

Finally, I am not sure how much longer we can assume Marvin Vettori has a mythical chin. People talk as if this is an axiomatic feature of Vettori's game, but I could see him wearing shots differently after the Cannonier fight. That was a massive beatdown.

 

[Kryptt]

Vettori is a brick! Hoping Allen takes this...