Media McGregor Has 'Bad Grappling: Myth?

Crom Cruach said:
The two world class grapplers he faced sliced through his TDD with ease.

He has fought mostly strikers.
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Khabib got 3 of 7 takedowns. Mendes, 4 of 7. They were certainly better grapplers. But my point isn't he's world-class. It's that he's absolutely capable. And quite good at that.
 
Conor ground game is very underated.
When you spoke with people that rolled with him, they all the same things ,he is VERY good.

I believe his top game is better than his bottom game though.

I will not be surprise if he subs Cowboy.
 
I think the evidence shows that his skills are actually at quite a high level, his desire to use them in an offensive capacity however is almost non existent and that leads to the common misconception.

His 2 sub losses pre UFC came at a time where he openly admits to having next to no bjj, his 2 sub losses in the UFC for me were more down to exhaustion than technical ability.
 
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it's just average/maybe a little above average for a pure striker.


theres just so many bitter pathetic conor haters that are still under the delusion that he isn't good, theres no gray area for them it's either black or white.


his main problem has always been and will probably always be cardio.
 
UFCFreak89 said:
I thought he did really well in round 1 of the khabib fight.
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That first take down attempt, you can see he had worked hard on in the gym, and i was very impressed. But at the point where Khabib still finished it, you could see Conor's confidence disappear and he mentally lost the whole fight right there.

When all the shit you think you can do, it turns out you cant, it destroys your confidence.
 
Spath said:
People compare his striking to his ground game, which is why they think it’s not good. He’s a damn good striker and his striking is obviously better than his grappling.

His grappling isn’t bad by any means. I’d say that there are plenty of guys in the UFC who he could outgrapple, but as he would also get squished by some elite grapplers he’s not seen as a very crafted grappler. There aren’t too many guys who could just fight him standing and beat him.

Pettis has very good BJJ and is very dangerous on the ground. Nate Diaz tooled him and made it look easy... So getting handled on the ground against Diaz (and Khabib) is... normal. Is normal.

:eek:
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Very well said. I alluded to the comparison of his striking and grappling too. I think it's certainly a factor in this misconception.
 
THE BMF said:
Yea we seen that Conor has a decent clinch game, tdd against Eddie and solid bjj game is his sweep of Diaz and keeping khabib brutal GNP neutralised in round 1 but he doesn’t have an aggressive sub game especially of his back I don’t think I have every seen him through up a submission which is bad for a bjj brown belt, and when fights go on he gets taken down easier as seen by khabib.

He is too divisive a figure to have a genuine discussion about his skills on here i have found out.

Btw I’ll give your video a watch in a bit I am subscribed.
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Yeah, it's difficult to know what his offensive game is like off his back because we haven't seen much.

I will say that that doesn't necessarily mean it's bad, because a lack of activity in regards to submissions from the bottom could be a strategic decision. Certainly for somebody who would rather be on the feet.

Oh, and thank you mate.
 
He's a pretty good defensive wrestler. Haven't seen anything from him offensively though.
 
Moral Victory said:
He is a pretty good grappler.

Even long ago when he tore his (acl?) Against Max and had to resort to wrestling and grappling he did really good, very slick, go watch it.

People think he has bad grappling but its because he is usually put in those bad positions when he's fatigued, which is his real weakness.
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Yeah, conditioning is by far the bigger concern.
 
Moral Victory said:
He is a pretty good grappler.

Even long ago when he tore his (acl?) Against Max and had to resort to wrestling and grappling he did really good, very slick, go watch it.

People think he has bad grappling but its because he is usually put in those bad positions when he's fatigued, which is his real weakness.
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He didn't grapple because he tore his ACL. He tore his ACL while grappling. He tries to do a half guard pass and hyperextended his own knee.

Conor is good. About average for your run of the mill brown belt. Nothing spectacular at a competitive level outside of his admittedly great TDD.
 
Thickfreakness said:
Khabib got 3 of 7 takedowns. Mendes, 4 of 7. They were certainly better grapplers. But my point isn't he's world-class. It's that he's absolutely capable. And quite good at that.
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Idk he's still just average to me. People reference the khabib fight but his best defense in the grappling was cheating. Alot of the infractions he was committing were directly preventing Khabib from advancing position. So I mean we can agree he doesn't suck, but he isn't any better than Michael Johnson or Barboza. To me it seems every grappling exchange seems to take a little something out of him. So no matter how technically capable he is, it's definitely a bit of a kryptonite for him.
 
My biggest issue with Conor's grappling is that he refuses to work on his guard for non survival scenarios (holding people grown to stop GnP). He will drill nothing but top game despite never having any intention of taking someone down. He only drills escapes, stand ups, TDD, and top game. Crazy to me when all of your losses come from you being put on your back
 
His grappling is likely good. He's used it offensively before and gets to train with talented grapplers. It's just never going to be able to compete with Khabib's. Even life long grapplers have trouble with khabib so it's not like thats an insult or anything. It's why it's such a rough match, if you can't catch him or consistently stuff the TD you're just going to lose. Whether it be by him eventually finishing you with pressure or the inevitable decision cause you spent the entire fight just frantically trying to defend and not actually fighting. Conor will likely never be good enough once under khabib to be able to intiate consistent scrambles or submission attempts so he'll just lose once the grappling begins. Especially considering we know his cardio likely won't hold up past rd 3.
 
Below average for a top 5 fighter but not bad.
 
Thing is it's subjective. Mac could probably walk on to most mats and handle everyone there. Problem is though that he does not have the skill to stop the best of the best and guess who makes it to the ufc
 
superpunch said:
His ground game -- like his BJJ -- isn't bad. His problem is that he has very bad wresting for championship level fights. Other strikers like Aldo have much better TDD. That means that non-manlet championship level grapplers will grapple fuck him all day.
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I don't know man. His takedown defense has been pretty on point apart from a few examples I mentioned.
 
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