One of Leon Edwards major mistakes that cost him

[j18lee]

A lot of reasons that Leon was beaten. Basically, Belal was just better of course. However, it was surprising to many, including myself, because Edwards had soundly beaten high level wrestlers like Usman and Covington.

Of course the biggest reason were the countless takedowns that Leon couldn't stop from the very first round. Which, again, was confounding because his takedown defense had been stellar prior to this fight. Much credit to Belal, looking like a poor man's WW Khabib. (only reason he wasn't quite WW Khabib because he did get reversed a few times).

One huge mistake that I thought hadn't been mentioned enough was Leon's inexplicably terrible cross guard defense. I am a former amateur boxer and coach and I had been very impressed with Leon's boxing in the past. However, I was shocked to see him so poorly employ the cross arm defense, sticking his right elbow way out and keeping his right hand extended, exposing his chin completely to uppercuts. Belal rocked him HARD with that uppercut right through that opening from the very first round. I felt that hurt Leon badly and thus compromised his takedown defense. The takedowns came continuously as a result, then the head spike and it was complete dominance by Belal. An impressive all around performance by Belal.

Except his post fight speech. Man, can that guy be any more boring? He just won the title after years of being overlooked and bypassed. There's the whole hometown booing and hating on him. He had the Palestinian conflict to be passionate about. He would have played a villain against the crowd, or a hero spokesman to his people. But man, that guy is so bland and boring.

 

[Marko Polo]

Leon didn’t evolve. Belal did

Belal knew Leon would be throwing his laser straights, so Belal went and trained with Khabib and I think Javier Mendez who pioneered the defensive boxing skills of fighters like DC and Velasquez. Trained with some new boxing coach as well who deserves credit. Belal was super confident in his own abilities going in, the coaches deserve credit for preparing him to that level. On the night you have to go and deliver, and we saw Belal getting inside slipping Leon’s offence. He even slipped and punished Leon a couple of times, which is very high level stuff.

 

[WoozyFailGuy]

I was thinking his cross guard was off as well, didn't see the point of it in the moment.
I think his larger issue was constantly backing up to the cage.

 

[blaseblase]

When's the last time those "high level wrestlers" actually did any wrestling? It's an open secret that Usman's knees have been shot for years, Colby has been ducking every top contender he possibly could and hiding his own decline. Leon started thinking he was a wrestler based on finding success against two shot guys and it cost him.

 

[Poirierfan]

Leon got beat due to him contracting Leonitis, it's hard to perform with that stuff.

 

[Corrado Soprano]

If the fight was at 5pm instead of 5am, Leon would still be champ.

 

[Rhood]

If the fight was at 5pm instead of 5am, Leon would still be champ.

 

[It Just Is]

Leon fought too timidly. In the first fight, he was pressing Belal hard and only used the fence when he was pushed into it. In this fight, Belal took the center of the octagon, pressed Leon up against the fence, and was able to dictate where the fight was going. I think it was a mindset kind of thing, because Leon was in no danger really. Belal fought confidently and implemented his gameplan.

Could be because Belal knew his sets up, wrestling, and grappling got better, but I think it was that plus Leon wasn't as confident this time.

 

[Kowboy On Sherdog]

Letting Belal have a better game plan?

 

[flektarn]

I know he was good at using the cage to stop TDs from Marty...but maybe circle off it sometimes. Especially when belal kept getting the TDs against the cage.
We saw a 5th round Colby keep Leon on the mat. Leon isn't some TDD phenom.
And that guard wasn't doing him favors on the feet. He was getting lit up by belal "canelo" Muhammad.

 

[Mammothman]

Well said, I think Leon striking looked not very good, I'm not sure if it was due to the fear of the takedown or Belal's awkward striking, probably both.

The fact that Leon usually plays it safe and Belal but the pressure on him might be a reason too.

 

[usernamee]

It looked like he had drilled the cross guard his entire camp and wanted to use it at as much as possible even if it was the right choice or not because he thought it looked cool or something lol

 

[Harlekin]

His cross guard sucked
Not enough lateral movement to avoid the cage
His punches were slow motion
Got outhustled at combination punching
Him trying to grab and getting into the clinch failed a lot

Belal just walked inside and won there. Really weird, Leon looked really off

But funny:
Belal wanted to wrestle and won 3 rounds that way
Leon didn't want to wrestle, but still won 2 rounds that way

If Leon tried a grappling gameplan, I think his chances of winning 3 rounds would've been bigger.

 

[ticho123]

Edwards must've been stunned from the slam or something, he was so gun shy. It was like everytime he actually did something he had Belal reacting, even at the very end when it was already over and he got top position for like 5 seconds which was enough to have Belal bloody and covering up. Super disappointing performance

 

[chinarice]

It's the same thing Khabib and Islam do and fighters just can't seem to keep the center of the cage, where all these guys don't shoot blast doubles so they have a lot harder time taking people down.

Seems like fighters can't stop it though and just get stuck against the cage where they can work clinch takedowns, hip tosses, etc.

If he could have kept the center of the cage, he would have done a lot better.

 

[DoubleTrouble]

A lot of reasons that Leon was beaten. Basically, Belal was just better of course. However, it was surprising to many, including myself, because Edwards had soundly beaten high level wrestlers like Usman and Covington.

Of course the biggest reason were the countless takedowns that Leon couldn't stop from the very first round. Which, again, was confounding because his takedown defensive had been stellar prior to this fight. Much credit to Belal, looking like a poor man's WW Khabib. (only reason he wasn't quite WW Khabib because he did get reversed a few times).

One huge mistake that I thought hadn't been mentioned enough was Leon's inexplicably terrible cross guard defense. I am a former amateur boxer and coach and I had been very impressed with Leon's boxing in the past. However, I was shocked to see him so poorly employ the cross arm defense, sticking his right elbow way out and keeping his right hand extended, exposing his chin completely to uppercuts. Belal rocked him HARD with that uppercut right through that opening from the very first round. I felt that hurt Leon badly and thus compromised his takedown defense. The takedowns came continuously as a result, then the head spike and it was complete dominance by Belal. An impressive all around performance by Belal.

Except his post fight speech. Man, can that guy be any more boring? He just won the title after years of being overlooked and bypassed. There's the whole hometown booing and hating on him. He had the Palestinian conflict to be passionate about. He would have played a villain against the crowd, or a hero spokesman to his people. But man, that guy is so bland and boring.

Leon's never had particularly good hands though tbh. His kicks are his best weapon.

 

[DoubleTrouble]

His cross guard sucked
Not enough lateral movement to avoid the cage
His punches were slow motion
Got outhustled at combination punching
Him trying to grab and getting into the clinch failed a lot

Belal just walked inside and won there. Really weird, Leon looked really off

But funny:
Belal wanted to wrestle and won 3 rounds that way
Leon didn't want to wrestle, but still won 2 rounds that way

If Leon tried a grappling gameplan, I think his chances of winning 3 rounds would've been bigger.

This 5.30am fight time had a lot to do with it too I think.

 

[djacobox372]

Leon fought about the same as he did when he knocked out Usman.. only this time he didn't land that kick.

A superior grappler always has a great chance of neutralizing a striker... that's just how the sport goes.

 

[don't ask]

I was also surprised he was eating those uppercuts. I'm assuming they thought that guard would make him harder to take down, but that makes no sense to me. Arms high, upright stance, vision obscured... if someone can explain what advantage they thought it offered against a wrestler, I'd love to hear it.

 

[HHJ]

I dont think he expected Belal to crowd him fearlessly like he did. He thought hed get the space like he had with Usman and Colby