Even if these guys don't go into coaching, it's strange that you still see very few fighters who are willing to look at and learn from fights. Very few fighters use unorthodox techniques, including those which have proven to be effective in past fights. They mostly have that cookie-cutter mindset where they'll just go to the gym to get better at wrestle-boxing. The goal is to be a better wrestle-boxer than the other guy. MMA has stagnated like most of the TMAs.
Most fighters freeze up when someone throws something outside of the cookie-cutter template, like a front kick to the body or a side kick to the knee. Guys like McGregor, Jones, and Anderson Silva have exploited that. Some fighters, when faced with the opportunity to evolve as martial artists, instead call for "new" techniques like the oblique kick to be banned. They want to keep things strictly wrestle-boxing.
Most guys go to the gym just to improve their wrestle-boxing. They don't learn anything from fighters of the past or present. Knowledge which should have been gained from past fights has gone to that graveyard too.
Look how well Sakuraba was able to shut down the guard game. I know it's not as easy as just going in there and doing it, but how many guys do you see even try to replicate the techniques he used? I don't understand it. Very few of these guys are martial artists.
I remember reading a story on here a long while back about someone who said they met Anderson Silva. I think this was around his Cage Rage days. They said that they saw him in a shop scouring instructional DVDs/books from disciplines that you don't usually see in MMA. That's what Anderson is like and its a big reason why he has been so successful. He incorporates a lot of that stuff for mindgames and fun, but he does study it.
