What to expect from Islam at WW

[Marko Polo]

Any guy moving up immediately has better striking relative to his new peers. The step up in power is not as relevant as the speed advantage the smaller man brings. I expect Islam to look fast and do better than people expect in the stand up.

But unlike at LW, when things get tough Islam won’t be able to just ragdoll JDM at will. Islam couldn’t really do that at Lightweight anyway to be fair. Poirier gave him a much tougher fight than people anticipated. But Islam is crafty, unlike Khabib who used to brute force his opponents into submission, Islam is more cerebral, he sets traps.

JDM as we know is a supremely talented fighter. Might even be the best to come out of that region, which is a massive compliment considering guys like Volk and Adesanya exist. But I can see it. Volk is a very good striker in his own right, but he doesn’t have the guile and craftiness of JDM. JDM throws combinations that a boxer would throw, with perfect shot selection. He reminds me a little bit of a Diaz brother in his style, but a hell of a lot more effective and dangerous.

Islam deserves a lot of kudos for taking this fight, for chasing glory.

 

[BJJ4Tone]

I expect people to talk shit.
That's all you can ever guarantee.

 

[Randy Fandy Fo Fanders]

I expect dominance

 

[oski]

 

[Tweak896]

I think his grappling will translate fine, he won't be that undersized. As far as striking, the WWs might have range that would give him trouble that LWs never did, so there might be some issues with jabs/straights at range.

Honestly think this is a lock that he wins and makes it look easy. But as far as future, I think he either fights Usman for his title defense or something weird like Khamzat moving down, only big fights. He's probably cashing out the rest of his career until he loses or retires in the next few fights. Topuria at LW if WW has no money fights.

I just don't see Islam being a real WW champ and getting in the mix very long, like defending against Brady, Garry, Shavkat (well maybe him), Morales.

 

[jeff7b9]

It's going to come down to how well JDM can't stick to a gameplan and avoid being in a bad position.

As a general rule of thumb I pick against the guy who needs to be perfect for 25 minutes, which in this case is JDM.

I see the striking as:

Edge to JDM if/when JDM is southpaw *
Roughly even while JDM is orthodox

grappling : big edge Islam

Scrambles: life or death situations for JDM every time.

JDM makes mistakes he has gotten away with in Scrambles.

Specifically openings for

Arm triangle
Darce
anaconda

if i had to guess the most likely outcomes it would be islam by one of those submissions, then islam dec, jdm dec, jdm tko, islàm tko, NC, draw, jdm sub ... in that order.


I don't recall seeing JDM ever fight southpaw all night or even heavily lopsided to that stance... which is what I think he would have to do to give himself the best chance to win.

A) it creates more distance to cover
B) Islam uses less weapons and specifically loses several of his most effective weapons when opponent is southpaw...

which I think has a lot to do with why Dustin over performed.

 

[HNIC215]

He’s been training with bigger fighters his entire career.

No weight cut will be good for him - energy wise.

I expect to see a refreshed and powerful Islam out there on Saturday night - a man with a purpose to secure his dream and legacy.

Khabib trained him hard this camp, so you know he will be ready both mentally and physically.

 

[Streeter]

His biggest issue is strength. He won't be able to rag doll folks as easy. Hes not a great striker- his tske down threat makes his decent striking look better than it. At ww with the le gth he will have more trouble there as well. If Usman has anything left hes a bad match up for Mak. So is Shavat.

 

[RockyLockridge]

I expect him to duck the top 5 or only fight them on short notice or with some other compromise like he did with the LW division.

Dont believe me? his manager is already angling for usman

 

[JKS]

I expect him to duck the top 5 or only fight them on short notice or with some other compromise like he did with the LW division.

Dont believe me? his manager is already angling for usman

Not really hard to believe lol.....That manager is also Usman's manager. They both share the same guy who wants both his guys to get big fights.

 

[RockyLockridge]

Not really hard to believe lol.....That manager is also Usman's manager. They both share the same guy who wants both his guys to get big fights.

Usman is literally not even in the top 5 most deserving WWs

 

[JKS]

Usman is literally not even in the top 5 most deserving WWs

Not even close top 5 deserving, there are guys outside the top 5 that deserve it more. But this is more about Ali being a good manager and business/politics, than his team wanting him to avoid a top 5 and legit contenders. If Ali wasn't managing Usman, they wouldn't mention his name.