Raymond Daniels was 2 minutes from winning.

Why is it so hard to believe that a fighter would go easy early on in the fight? It's an extremely common tactic. I know you watch a lot of fights, this should have been obvious to you.

Now I will certainly agree that Daniels has at least proven himself to be a tough fighter.

Holzken was absolutely going easy in the first 2 rounds however.


Theres a difference between going easy and putting yourself in unfavorable positions, missing punches and looking sluggish. I wrote in the live thread Holzken is preserving energy myself but there is no denying he looked off. at least to me.


the truth is probably somewhere in the middle.


Yup, just coincidence that nieky picked up the pace and it ended

Has more to do with the fact that Daniels can't take a punch.
 
No, he wasn't, Holzken was lighting him up in the third, then landed that knee, then continued to beat him up. Daniels was doing well up until the third though.
 
Ya the instant the 3rd round started Nieky began to beat the living shit out of Daniels. Had that cut not stopped the fight a KO would have. The writing was on the wall.

Daniels does get a lot of unnecessary hate, but let's not misinterpret the fight because of it.
 
Theres a difference between going easy and putting yourself in unfavorable positions, missing punches and looking sluggish. I wrote in the live thread Holzken is preserving energy myself but there is no denying he looked off. at least to me.

everyone can have a bad day, and Holzken also had an injury.
In any case it wouldn't have changed the result as he won and was about to KO Daniels if the fight hadn't been stopped.
 
in Holzken's post fight interview, he said daniels was yelling at him, saying he couldn't see. So i think the cut was serious lol
 
Its pretty clear only half the folks in this thread actually watched the fight. However I have no problem with Daniels as he adds another dimension to the Sport.

I do have a problem with the 12oz gloves glory makes their lighter weight fighters wear. It just looks bad. Anyone know the reason for this?
 
Lol wait so everyone is just going to pretend that Holzken didnt look very good and was missing punches or anything?

Taking it slow in the early rounds is one thing but if Daniels is able to hit you and dodge your counters you are not coasting, you are being outboxed.

I know everyone on this board has a hateboner for Daniels but I think it's time to start giving him some credit for his capabilities as well. Keep in mind that he is still improving with every fight and has only fought K-1 ruleset like 7 times.

It sucks that Glory has shit matchmaking because otherwise we would know how good he really is. I mean a fight against someone like Groenhart would a good matchup but we all know that he will probably face another MMA fighter making his kickboxing debut.
 
Just accept the truth. Daniels improved and gave Nieky trouble in rds 1 & 2.
 
Nieky looked kinda off. Dunno if it was because of daniels style of just a 'bad' night for him. Either way, It was so far a draw with maybe daniels slightly winning by round 2 but 3rd round was where Holzken pressed that turbo and started winning.
 
Originally Posted by Yodsanan
Has more to do with the fact that Daniels can't take a punch.

Yeah bro, Nieky has massive pillow fists. And those knees... i can take those knees to the head all night long. No problem. GTFOH!!!
 
Last edited:
Lol wait so everyone is just going to pretend that Holzken didnt look very good and was missing punches or anything?

Taking it slow in the early rounds is one thing but if Daniels is able to hit you and dodge your counters you are not coasting, you are being outboxed.

I know everyone on this board has a hateboner for Daniels but I think it's time to start giving him some credit for his capabilities as well. Keep in mind that he is still improving with every fight and has only fought K-1 ruleset like 7 times.

It sucks that Glory has shit matchmaking because otherwise we would know how good he really is. I mean a fight against someone like Groenhart would a good matchup but we all know that he will probably face another MMA fighter making his kickboxing debut.

I like Daniels and he brings another dimension to Kickboxing with his Points Karate style and it's nice seeing fighters with different style and flashiness then just Muay Thai fighters doing leg kicks.
 
I like Daniels and he brings another dimension to Kickboxing with his Points Karate style and it's nice seeing fighters with different style and flashiness then just Muay Thai fighters doing leg kicks.
*Dutch fighters doing leg kicks

Muay Thai fighters typically kick to the body.
 
Lol wait so everyone is just going to pretend that Holzken didnt look very good and was missing punches or anything?

Taking it slow in the early rounds is one thing but if Daniels is able to hit you and dodge your counters you are not coasting, you are being outboxed.

I know everyone on this board has a hateboner for Daniels but I think it's time to start giving him some credit for his capabilities as well. Keep in mind that he is still improving with every fight and has only fought K-1 ruleset like 7 times.

It sucks that Glory has shit matchmaking because otherwise we would know how good he really is. I mean a fight against someone like Groenhart would a good matchup but we all know that he will probably face another MMA fighter making his kickboxing debut.

He has fought Holzken twice and Valtellini once and lost all 3. I would say him stepping up in class hasnt worked out so well.

To say people have a "hateboner" for Daniels is just garbage trolling. The people logically discussing this fight dont have hate for the guy, they just understand how the sport works.

Did you watch the first 3 round Daniels/Holzken fight? Look at how things went when Nieky understood he only had 3 rounds. Do you think with the years of martial arts Daniels has been in that in 6 months he magically became so much better then those 20 years of training he had before?

No Nieky watched Daniels fights and understood exactly how to win. He did exactly that in both fights.

The truth is Daniels got these fights because he is American and flashy, there is a reason they havent given him anyone other then cans and top level guys.

No matter how much you want to try and strawman people who actually watched the fight, the truth is the truth.
 
There is no doubt Nieky is kickboxing's best welterweight, but all this Daniels bashing is bullshit.

The way the fight went down was all part of Holzken's strategy was it? What was this strategy, get out boxed for over 2 rounds then wait to throw a couple hard punches and a knee and just hope for a ko?

I'm with you, I honestly expected Holzken to control and eventually stop Daniels. What actually happened was after 2 rounds of his face being a magnet he threw a knee that happened to cut Daniels in a nasty spot.

Who knows maybe underestimating Daniels had a part to play in this showing, maybe he was sick or suffered an undisclosed injury. All this is likely, but the fact is Daniels was impressive and Nieky got through this by the skin of his teeth.
 
I watched this fight again, and Daniels got the better of exchanges a few times, but to say he outboxed Nieky is false. A combination of Daniels surprisingly doing better than expected and his running style that caused Holzken to miss a few times has people confused. People are also just hating on Daniels because of his style too.

Gotta agree with Yodsanan in saying the truth is somewhere in the middle.
 
He has fought Holzken twice and Valtellini once and lost all 3. I would say him stepping up in class hasnt worked out so well.

To say people have a "hateboner" for Daniels is just garbage trolling. The people logically discussing this fight dont have hate for the guy, they just understand how the sport works.

Did you watch the first 3 round Daniels/Holzken fight? Look at how things went when Nieky understood he only had 3 rounds. Do you think with the years of martial arts Daniels has been in that in 6 months he magically became so much better then those 20 years of training he had before?

No Nieky watched Daniels fights and understood exactly how to win. He did exactly that in both fights.

The truth is Daniels got these fights because he is American and flashy, there is a reason they havent given him anyone other then cans and top level guys.

No matter how much you want to try and strawman people who actually watched the fight, the truth is the truth.

The fact that you just said that people on this forum do not have a hateboner for Daniels shows that you do are not a frequent visitor to the KB/MT forum or that you haven't really paid attention because a lot of people really do hate on Raymond's style of fighting.

Also how am I twisting the truth? I never denied that Holzken was using the old but common strategy of taking it slow the first couple rounds and turning it up later nor am I denying that Holzken is the better fighter, However, you can do that without LOSING the first two rounds. There is a difference between coasting/taking it slow and a point karateka having the better off the boxing exchanges for two rounds.

In a sport with incompetent refs that are quick to call slips knockdowns, losing two rounds is never a good strategy because before you know it you slip because of a kick and the ref gives you an 8 count (Like the previous fight between Holzken vs Daniels).

Also, Daniels definitely has improved a lot, I mean his hands and defense still need plenty of work and all but there is a big difference between the Daniels that fought Valtellini and the Daniels now. When he fought Valtellini he had no boxing game to speak of and couldnt check lowkicks at all. He is pretty much improving per fight, but I wonder how much time he has left since he is 35 years old.


EDIT: When i said that Daniels outboxed Holzken, I obviously did not mean that Daniels is the better boxer or anything like that. I'm just saying that he got the better of the exchanges for the first two rounds. Just want to clarify that.
 
I still don't agree with that. I had Holzken winning the second round. Daniels landed a few shots when Holzken completely stopped putting out offense in like the last 30 seconds but the rest of that round was was Holzken stalking and landing clean shots while Daniels was frantically moving around hitting gloves or glancing shots.

The first round was close too.
 
I think that the 'hate' is really just annoyance with being told that Daniels is 'elite' (in the GG format) when there is so little evidence to support it.

Consider this: If a random iranian TKD guy went 0-3 vs Nieky and Joe, getting finished every time, nobody would be crazy enough to call him elite.
 
Back
Top