It has led to him becoming a dominant champion who currently sits behind only Jon Jones on the pound for pound list. During his time in the UFC he has subtly continued to tweak his training and his fight game. While he has not made many major changes to his game and style, he has adjusted when needed. When you break him down Aldo is still one of the best in the world and very technically sound. We saw him use it against Edgar who has some of the best boxing in MMA himself. It went from being a liability to one of the best in the UFC. He has changed his diet and approach to cutting weight and has had no real problem since that fight. Instead, he went out and fixed those two holes. Like a true champion he did not sit on the laurels of his victory in that fight. Hominick was able to slip it easily as the fight went on and do some damage to Aldo’s body which contributed to him wearing down in that fight – as did an extremely difficult weight cut. The big issue he had in that fight was his jab. It was the one where he showed the most vulnerability. The only fight he really even struggled in was the Hominick fight. Always ready to attack, even in a defensive mode. When he moves back to avoid strikes he stays balanced and ready to attack. It is not just his head movement that is amazing but his movement in general. He fights with very solid defense, anchored by his excellent head movement and impeccable footwork. The problem Aldo’s opponents have when facing him is he does not leave many openings himself. Even Chan Sung Jung was more cautious in the way he attacked Aldo in their fight. Part of the lack of finishes from those four fights comes from the way they fought Aldo. Instead he is looking for you to make a mistake. As a fighter he is always ready when the opportunity occurs but he will not take chances to get the finish. The four who went the distance fought smart fights and did not give Aldo any openings for a finish. The four he did not finish were Ricardo Lamas, Frankie Edgar, Kenny Florian, and Mark Hominick. The two fighters he stopped were Mendes, which is his only loss to date, and The Korean Zombie. The truth is he has finished two of his six title fights in the UFC. It is easy to say that he is because he is not finishing fights as frequently as he did in the past but that is just a quick surface view of the situation. It will also be different than the first fight between them. It is a good story between the two camps adding some hype and drama to the fights but this will be different than Dillashaw and Barao. Barao is a different fighter than Aldo and Dillashaw is different from Mendes. What Dillashaw did against Barao will have no real bearing on this fight at all. His lone loss came back in 2005 and it was just three years later in 2008 when Mendes had his first MMA fight. Being the same old Aldo has earned him an impressive 24-1 record with a perfect 9-0 in UFC and WEC title fights. Is that because Dillashaw beat Barao and by the transitory properties of MMA his teammate will be able to beat Barao’s teammate? Or is it because Aldo, if not slipping, he is at best just staying the same old Aldo leaving him vulnerable to the improving Mendes. This is the first fight where it seems like his opponent has a legitimate chance to win the fight. Even in those fights he has rarely been pushed and never really threatened. As he moved up and start fighting the best in the world his opponents started making less mistakes leaving him very few openings to seize. He is like a shark with blood in the water at sensing your mistakes as you make them during the fight. Those fighters would make a lot of mistakes and Aldo is brilliant at capitalizing on his opponent’s mistakes. When he was a challenger working his way up in the WEC he fought several fighters who never even made it into the UFC and several that were with them only a short time. It is not just about Aldo but also his opponent and how they fight him. In Aldo’s case it is not understanding the situation fully.
I am amazed at how often people criticize Aldo and other UFC champions for being conservative. Here we will take a look at what Mendes needs to do win the title and what Aldo needs to do to retain it. You instinctually would not think that after watching the first fight but Mendes seems to have improved more than Aldo in the almost three years since the first fight. They meet next at UFC 179 for the second time and this is the biggest challenge facing Aldo in his career to date. Dillashaw – the rivalry between Jose Aldo and Chad Mendes heated up. After Nova Uniao’s Renan Barao lost his title to Team Alpha Male’s T.J.
0 kommentar(er)
