Submissions in the UFC And Their Decline
This week on the podcast the guys discuss the decline of submissions in the UFC. This is a segment toward the end of this weeks Obviously Fight Talk Podcast where they discuss a Reddit thread from the week on the decline of submissions (percentage) in the UFC. Why is this happening in the sport and is there a seed change?
MMA analyst and coach Brendan Dorman joins the crew to give his take. Looking back to the beginning when MMA was a relatively new sport. So along with the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and the Gracie family were also new on the scene. So they were doing things no one had ever seen before.
Submissions in the UFC were commonplace as many fighters simply didn’t know how to defend against them. So this left rich pickings for the BJJ players on the scene at the time. But as the sport developed so did people’s understanding of submissions and how to stop them.
The Evolution of Submissions in MMA
This along with developments within Jiu-Jitsu as different camps rose to prominence. The result of which was innovations and ways in which many submission attempts could be nullified. And then we have the rise of the super athlete and many UFC fighters who have a base in wrestling.
This allows them to stop many of the takedown attempts of BJJ players which in the past would have been far more successful. And with many of these submission artists using grappling as their number one tool. Striking often comes a distant second, leaving them open to finishes by better standup fighters.
The guys go through the most used submissions through the years and the reason behind a noticeable dip in the late 1990s. As well as it being more impressive if a fighter today can get a submission win versus back in the day. In a time when people were still learning the sport and offering up all kinds of opportunities to submission specialists.
The guys also analyse certain fighters and what they bring to the table in terms of their skillset. How they dealt with and got their own submissions. And how the well-rounded fighter has incorporated all aspects of grappling into their game. Where the sport is no and what are we to expect going forward in the ever-evolving world of mixed martial arts and the UFC.
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