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Not convinced Spivac has the best grappling at heavyweight until he fights Jailton Almeida

It would be an interesting fight and it's one I've been wanting to see for a long time. Both are physically strong with solid BJJ games and can place you in all sorts of trouble on the mat. Spivak even in his slimmer form strikes me as more of a natural HW, but I don't know that that matters all that much. He is very much a committed judoka with mediocre wrestling whereas Jailton is a guy who has exceptional wrestling... but has been tossed around by Judo throws before. IMO Almeida is faster and more athletic to a pretty damning degree... but if for some reason the grappling got nullified in the fight, I would fully expect Spivak to box him up. Sergey has developed some pretty serviceable hands in these past couple of years with an emphasis on his jab. He even caught Ciryl with it a few times. Conversely, Almeida's capabilities in any protracted striking affair is still a big old ??????? as wild as that is to say about a ranked dude who's had almost 10 fights under the UFC's banner.

My initial suspicion is that Almeida would be able to use his speed to make Spivak uncomfortable by utilizing a bunch of lower-body shots in order to get in on his hips and topple the big man and force him into constant scrambles. Spivak would probably be able to explode out of a few bad positions and survive for a while, but I think eventually Jailton would either take his back and choke him or pound him out.

That said, I wouldn't be surprised to see Spivak beat him. Aside from the aforementioned striking advantage, I think the uchi mata/harai goshi could be there as counters to Jailton's shots, especially against the cage. We've seen other fighters hit those, including against Almeida. Spivak also has a nice front headlock sequence and heavy GnP. Jailton has shown some questionable fight IQ & killer instinct during his transitions at times, too.
 
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Not even close to best grappling

Werdum retired still better grappler

Almeida probably

Aspinall probably

Any real American wrestler probably

Everyone needs to chill out - Spivac is NOT that great
 
Safton said:
It would be an interesting fight and it's one I've been wanting to see for a long time. Both are physically strong with solid BJJ games and can place you in all sorts of trouble on the mat. Spivak even in his slimmer form strikes me as more of a natural HW, but I don't know that that matters all that much. He is very much a committed judoka with mediocre wrestling whereas Jailton is a guy who has exceptional wrestling and has been tossed around by Judo throws before. IMO Almeida is faster and more athletic to a pretty damning degree... but if for some reason l the grappling got nullified in the fight, I would fully expect Spivak to box him up. Sergey has developed some pretty serviceable hands in these past couple of years with an emphasis on his jab. He even caught Ciryl with it a few times. Conversely, Almeida's capabilities in any protracted striking affair is still a big old ??????? as wild as that is to say about a ranked dude who's had almost 10 fights under the UFC's brand.

My initial suspicion is that Almeida would be able to use his speed to make Spivak uncomfortable by utilizing a bunch of lower-body shots in order to get in on his hips and topple the big man and force him into constant scrambles. Spivak would probably be able to explode out of a few bad positions and survive for a while, but I think eventually Jailton would either take his back and choke him or pound him out.

That said, I wouldn't be surprised to see Spivak beat him. Aside from the aforementioned striking advantage, I think the uchi mata/harai goshi could be there as counters to Jailton's shots, especially against the cage. We've seen other fighters hit those, including against Almeida. Spivak also has a nice front headlock sequence and heavy GnP. Jailton has shown some questionable fight IQ & killer instinct during his transitions at times, too.
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Anyone who possesses enough wrestling to counter Almeida's shots has a good chance at beating him. Spivak has that, and his standup is better than Almeida's too.
 
Rhood said:
Almeida is the most dangerous grappler at HW.
Spivac looked good against a lower ranked opponent in the division, but how would he handle Almeida?
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I mean yeah he straight up isn’t the most dangerous grappler while Almeida is around. Tbf though atleast he managed to actually sub Derrick Lewis while Almeida couldn’t. Spivak doesn’t have Almeida’s ability to take people down constantly.
 
usernamee said:
Best HW wrestling has for me always been between either Spivac or Cain

They're neck and neck
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Spivac is a good grappler, has strength and submissions. He didn’t get close to putting his hands on Gane, though..
 
Poirierfan said:
Anyone who possesses enough wrestling to counter Almeida's shots has a good chance at beating him. Spivak has that, and his standup is better than Almeida's too.
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I don't know if he does or not, to be honest. His career TDD is 70% which is solid but not exceptional. In his first fight with Tybura, it was Marcin who won every wrestling exchange. Even in this rematch Tybura managed to wrestle up from his knees and put Spivak on his back. Old Man Oleinik also managed to drag him down.

Almeida's wrestling has looked difficult for most HWs to stop. The way he consistently manages to get in on the hips of lifelong wrestlers like Blaydes and Abdurakhimov is impressive. That being said, we've seen some guys have success countering him in frames. Rozenstruik stuffed his initial shot, Blaydes sprawled him out in Rd 2 and TKO'd him, Abdurakhimov & Lewis both kept exploding out of bad positions. I wouldn't be surprised to see Spivak manage to do the same and maybe even counter some of Almeida's forward pressure with well-timed throws (which is what Nasrudinov did to him). I'm just not sure if it would be enough or not.

I hope we get to see it at some point.
 
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