Nah, Tony didn't really look himself even before the arm break. I thought there was a pretty clear hesitancy in him compared to how he usually approaches the pocket and looks to draw out his opponent's attacks. It actually looked to throw Oliveira off a bit too because he seemed like he was prepared to be in counter mode and wait for Tony to crash into him, but had to take the lead himself because it wasn't happening. He definitely looked like his last loss affected his approach a bit, which is only normal when you get beat up that badly.Olivera has been rag dolling people at 155, I knew he was going to man handle Tony
The truth is Tony has garbage wrestling, it has always been terrible and his stand up was always very sloppy
The reason you think Tony wasn’t himself against Charles was because Charles basically broke his arm in the first. Tony had no chance of winning after that armbar
But to fair, few more seconds in the first and Charles would have won by TKO arm break. Tony was not getting out of that. Tony couldn’t do anything in the second and third because he literally had one arm, he couldn’t extend his left arm at all
I don't disagree with the other stuff though. Oliveira has gotten physically bigger and stronger over the years, and his wrestling has improved, and Tony's takedown defense has always been pretty bad. He tries to use his and his opponent's momentum to roll through, create scrambles, and threaten subs to prevent ending up in bad positions on the ground when he should be doing things like digging for underhooks, and that shit just didn't fly with the level of grappler Oliveira is. His striking is also very sloppy, but it's persistent, unorthodox, and he's willing to take shots to chip away at opponents. As I mentioned, that sort of style isn't sustainable, and it's the kind of approach that can work well until you meet someone who hits you hard enough to give you pause, which he did against MJ and Justin. After that Justin beating, he looked more wary of just sloppily pushing into the pocket against Oliveira, and if he can't do that, he can't start to set his pace. Add on top of Oliveira's wrestling and his lackluster takedown defense, and his cavalier manner of grappling that works against a lot of guys, but obviously not against someone who is MUCH better than he is on the ground, and he was doomed.
After that first round I already knew the fight was done. He of course tried to fight valiantly through the arm injury because that's just Tony, but all he could really do was survive. I honestly thought they might call it after the first.
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