What are some great in-fight adjustments you’ve seen turn the tide of a fight?

[FIghtxIQ]

Don't think Miocic was an in fight adjustment.

He hit DC with a body shot, saw that it hurt him and kept at it. It's not like he wss just head hunting, missing all of them, and decided to go to the body.

That is making an adjustment and Stipe has high fight IQ. Other fighters miss these details during fights, like when O'Malley hurt his leg and his opponent went for a take down instead.

 

[Portland8242]

He learned from the GOAT

It was actually that quick short elbow that rocked Cejudo and loosed his bearings to get finished by those knees.

 

[Portland8242]

Romero with his fight with Costa even though he lost (which I think he won)

He did his normally loopy punches on Costa through round 1 and part of round 2. He switched to straight punches late in round 2 and all of round 3 and was lighting him up. He would have easily finished Costa in a 5-rounder. Costa's guard is pretty basic and Romero eventually found his way through it.

 

[daPROFESSOR]

Leben vs Wanderlei

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

from

to

Not sure there’s ever been a prettier site in MMA than a Machida blitz IMO

Nice job by Jones to eventually time that ‘bow.

 

[elwani]

The Stipe/DC one was hilarious. Not only highlighting how horrible DCs defense always was specially to body strikes (which Barnett, Murr and even Anderson exposed) but the fact that Stipe just kept spamming the same hook over and over with weak setups like it was a UFC game and it worked and got DC finished <Lmaoo>

I think DC actually has a kind of a plan in his defense. He loves to put both of his arms straight out on the inside position. This naturally protects his head with his shoulders and helps him get the collar tie to draw in the opponent for the short hooks and uppercuts he loves. It's not a bad plan for a shorter guy who wants to fight from the inside or clinch. In boxing, there's a guard like it called the leverage guard, but there you only extend your left arm straight out. Maybe that's DC's downfall, is that he likes to extend out both arms, which left him open to the left body shot.

Don't think Miocic was an in fight adjustment.

He hit DC with a body shot, saw that it hurt him and kept at it. It's not like he wss just head hunting, missing all of them, and decided to go to the body.

I also think it was completely accidental on the first try and then he went with it because it worked. Nonetheless, a key takeaway from this fight (as obvious as it sounds) is if your opponent is using the straight arm defense, go for the body on the same side.

 

[BabyBlue_Bomber]

Miocic was getting dominated by Shane Del Rosario (RIP) the entire 1st round, which was spent standing up. In the 2nd round, Miocic took him down and finished him there...

Gomi/Pulver was a very close back and forth bout until Gomi decides to grab a hold of Pulver and start throwing knees to the body. After that Gomi started to take over...

Carla Esparza was dominated in the grappling against Calvillo, in the 1st round of their fight, but Esparza won the next 2 rounds pretty much with a right hand a low kick (though Calvillo also seemed to stop pushing the grappling so that helped Esparza out as well).

 

[Joshuaace]

Not really an adjustment so much as it was great decision making considering the circumstances. Usman's decision to stay standing and just kick the legs after Burns ended up on his back completely changed the fight. As bad as Kamaru was getting hurt on the feet, combined with his wrestling skill set; Following Burns to the ground would have seemed the most instinctive thing to do.

Not really a fan, but now credit Kamaru with higher "fight iq" than I had previously.

 

[vivi]

From memory Matt Brown vs Erick Silva, at first Matt was fighting too much at range and was getting hurt with body kicks in the first round. He eventually started closing the distance and really punishing Silva in the clinch with knees and elbows and eventually throwing in takedowns when Silva was hurt to the body and his TDD was compromised. Great fight.