The Southpaw Striking Guide: Part 1 - Advanced Basics

The southpaw is a dangerous opponent, the different stance he offers and his power coming from different angles mean that the majority of training a striker has done in his life will have next to no bearing on the one or two matches he will take with a southpaw through his career. One of the most popular requests I have had since starting this site is to break down the orthodox vs southpaw match up from a striking perspective, and I intend to do that here. I think it is particularly important that this area of strategy be better covered because with many wrestlers coming to MMA and sticking with their southpaw wrestling stance, southpaws are becoming more common in combat sports.

Left handedness is far from a prerequisite for learning to fight southpaw though. In striking circles it is noticable that in the Far East; Thailand, Japan particularly, southpaws are much more common, as is left handedness in general. However many of the more successful southpaws in the world are simply southpaws because they chose to be; Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, Mirko Cro Cop, Takanori Gomi and the Diaz brothers are all right handed, while Marvin Hagler and Manny Pacquiao are apparently ambidextrous. In MMA the southpaw stance vs an orthodox fighter also means a greater distance between the combatants and makes it near impossible for either fight to shoot a double leg takedown, meaning they must resort to single leg takedowns, easier to see coming and easier to defend - which largely accounts for the massive success of Machida and Silva despite their lack of a wrestling pedigree (also demonstrated by Alistair Overeem later in this piece). Clearly being a southpaw brings tremendous advantages.

'Open Guard': A Completely Different Fight

The first thing to learn is some basic terminology which I picked up from the Shotokan Karate legend Masahiko Tanaka. He refers in his book 'Perfecting Kumite' (pick it up if you can find it) to the standard right handed fighter vs right handed fighter position as "closed guard" - which also applies to a left handed fighter vs another left handed fighter. It is when the stances of both men do not match, i.e. left hander vs right hander, that we get a position known as "open guard". The reason for this being that when a southpaw and an orthodox fighter meet, their front knees act as a barrier and it is very difficult to get close and infight unless one of the fighters squares his feet up. The range and the dynamic of an open guard position are utterly different to a closed guard position, rather than head movement and combinations, the match becomes about hand fighting and footwork. Just look at the distance maintained between Sultan Ibragimov and Wladamir Klitschko here which Wlad can do almost nothing with despite his enormous reach.

It is important early on to establish that the jab will not work as readily in an open guard position as it will in a closed guard one. It is still possible to land, but requires specific tactics and isn't as useful as a go to technique as when fighting a fighter in the same stance. If an opponent is handfighting, or in a guard position, it is almost impossible to hit him cleanly with the jab. The one exception is if he is carrying his lead hand low or apparently no reason, as Diego Sanchez did in his "victory" over Martin Kampmann last year, in which Kampmann jabbed his face into a bloody mess.

Handfighting: The Base

Many coaches, when their student is facing a southpaw, advocate stepping the lead foot outside of the opponent's lead foot and firing a straight right lead. This is sound advice but can be complicated considerably if the fighter is not experienced in hand fighting. If an orthodox fighter can keep his lead hand on the outside of a southpaw's (while in contact), or vice versa, he can effectively limit his movement. It is very difficult to throw a rear hand straight when the lead hand is being pushed across the body or downward.

Moreover, when fighting from an "open guard" position keeping your lead hand on the outside of a southpaw opponent's will:
- Remove his jab
- Provide the opportunity to slap it down and strike him
- Allow you to gauge more easily when he intends to strike.

Watch this clip of KJ Noons vs Nick Diaz I, as they both come out Noons immediately nullifies Diaz's lead hand, with which he normally does the vast majority of his work. Because he has nullified Diaz's lead hand Noons knows that the left straight is coming and when he feels it he ducks and counters with a body shot. Noons outstruck Diaz so handily in this match that in the rematch Diaz switched to orthodox stance (something he rarely does) just to be able to use his enormous reach advantage over the natural lightweight.

When losing the hand fighting battle a fighter can use a couple of tactics to get back on track, re-establishing outside hand control is tricky to do however. The first is that he can drop his lead hand in the hopes of luring the opponent in and countering as Ibragimov is demonstrating against Klitschko above. The second is that he can use his footwork to back away and attempt to counter punch or take outside hand position as the opponent comes towards him. Watch as Diaz begins to win the hand fighting after a body jab from Noons, Diaz almost lands a nice 1-2 as Noons gets stuck on inside position. KJ backs up a few steps without offering a counter, then having taken himself out of hand fighting range he leaps in with a right straight as Diaz attempts to follow him.

Rear Leg Strikes

K. V. Gradapolov - the Soviet boxing team head coach for much of it's life, and a man full of useful advice - noted in his book "Tactics of Foreign Masters" (a translated version of which I will be bringing to Ebook format soon) when speaking of Bob Fitzsimmons' fondness of switching to a southpaw stance that the resulting position (open guard) changed the dynamic of the fight from a back and forth of salvos to a battle based on footwork and powerful pot shots with the rear hand. In MMA and kickboxing this certainly holds true and can be extended to leg strikes too. The majority of southpaw strikers favor the rear leg kick to the inside of their opponent's lead leg. Not only do most opponent's not train against this kick as often as they do against kicks to the outside of the lead leg, but their inner leg is far more sensitive naturally and is likely to be less conditioned. Lyoto Machida's entire style, when he is not annoying his opponent with the inside leg kick, is to draw them in by backing up just as Noons did above and letting them walk onto a rear side power strike, accompanied with a step outside of their lead leg and often by circling off afterward.  Against Silva (left) he already has control of his opponent's lead hand and has no need to fear a counter so pushes him back while stepping further to the outside of Silva's lead foot, tightening the angle through which his powerful rear hook travels. Against Ortiz (right) he is conscious of the takedown and instead circles out while attempting to snap Tito's head past him, before realising that Tito is already falling to the canvas.



Two others who have found enormous success with the rear knee strike by operating as southpaws (though of course the technique would work when performed by an orthodox fighter against a southpaw) are Giorgio Petrosyan, arguably the best kickboxer in the world today, and Alistair Overeem, the UFC's number one heavyweight contender. Notice how Petrosyan (left) has already stepped outside of his opponent's lead leg, shortening the distance necessary for his knee to travel. Though we cannot see his feet in this gif, just observe how far out his opponent's arm must swing (while almost fully extended) to get a hook in on him from his right. Clearly Giorgio is significantly off of his opponent's center line, indicating a step outside of his lead foot. Even if his opponent's strike had landed it would have so little momentum on it that Giorgio would likely have been unharmed, but being a perfect technician Giorgio's forearm is already there to stop it. Alistair Overeem (right) spent much of his recent fight with Brock Lesnar switching into the southpaw stance, just notice how Lesnar - known for his powerful, if primitive double leg - is forced to pick up a single leg rather than his traditional bull rush shot. After having weakened Lesnar with a couple of "uberknees" to the abdomen, Overeem remained in a southpaw stance and threw a brutal roundhouse kick to Lesnar's ribs.

Notice how Overeem's step outside of Lesnar's lead foot tightens the angle off his kick, meaning it impacts earlier in its arc. Just as with Machida's hook against Thiago Silva it proves much harder to stop this kick as it sneaks in. It doesn't appear much but the step outside takes almost half a foot off of the arc of the kick before impact, which in striking range accounts for the difference between time for an opponent to react, and him getting placed on his rear.

 Overeem has often switched into a southpaw stance to throw his left middle kick, rather than taking a quick switch-step as in Muay Thai, a tactic which he shares with Katsunori Kikuno and Pat Barry. He also utilized this technique on Gokhan Saki's broken arm and just before dropping Ben Edwards. Landing powerful kicks with the rear leg is noticeably easier from a southpaw stance against an orthodox opponent and vice versa, and is almost entirely responsible for the success of Yoksanklai Fairtex, Giorgio Petrosyan and Mirko Cro Cop.


Good handfighting, stepping outside of the opponent's lead foot and landing rear hand / leg strikes are only the beginnings of a good southpaw or anti-southpaw gameplan however. In coming installments we will examine Advanced Southpaw Tactics including angles and strikes that only exist from the open guard position.


To learn more about striking from a southpaw stance or against a southpaw stance I recommend purchasing either Anderson Silva's Striking Combinations DVD, Lyoto Machida's Box Set or the excellent boxing coach Kenny Weldon's entire series or just the volume that pertains to southpaws.

Please notice that www.Fightsgoneby.com now has a donate button in the top right, if you could see to donating even a dollar or two to the site it would make my commitment to continually bringing the deepest striking analysis on the net considerably easier. If donation isn't your thing then please do me the honor of recommending my site to your friends and followers!


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Southpaw Guide Begins Monday

After many requests to cover the subject of fighting as / against a southpaw, I am putting together the most comprehensive series on the subject available on the internet and indeed anywhere in print.

This first issue will be entitled "Advanced Basics" and will cover:

- The technique of hand fighting

- Stepping outside the lead foot

- Using rear side strikes.

While these are all pretty basic concepts I will be going into them in great depth, with gifs from Giorgio Petrosyan,Nick Diaz, Lyoto Machida, KJ Noons and Alistair Overeem. I will also be using the writings of Masahiko Tanaka and K. V. Gradapolov to illustrate points.

If that sounds like your sort of thing, make sure to be at www.fightsgoneby.com on Monday!

Cheers,
Jack Slack

Note: Kindly notice our new "donate" button. While all the content on this site at the moment is entirely free, I would appreciate any contributions from my fan base to cover the costs of my new .com domain and to make my writing life easier.

Great and Obscure Strikers #1: Mamoru Yamaguchi (HeadKickLegend Piece)

This article is part of my commitment to HeadKickLegend.com and continues there.






It is no secret around here that I have a great affinity for strikers, particularly those who can make wrestlers think twice about spamming takedown attempts. There is an embarrassment of riches in terms of talented strikers now entering the sport of MMA, simply because of the declining state of kickboxing and the growing purses and exposure of Mixed Martial Arts competition. My fondness of Japanese MMA stems from my fandom in the PRIDE FC days, and my taking up wrestling and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu in Tokyo while over there training my striking, and I have made sure to keep up to date with the current crop of talent working it's way through Shooto in hopes of DREAM FC returning to the form PRIDE FC was on. For the die hard fans of JMMA this list will provide nothing new, but those who are perhaps only familiar with the major U.S. promotions, this will provide an interesting little guide to some of the more entertaining fighters Asia has to offer.



Mamoru "The Fro" Yamaguchi


One of the premier names in the flyweight (125 lbs) division for the last five years, a Shooto champion and one of the most dynamic fighters in Japanese MMA. Mamoru Yamaguchi fights in Thai style shorts and is responsible for more dropped or KOd opponents in Shooto's oversized (5 oz.) gloves than anyone at 125lbs.The first time I saw Yamaguchi fight I realised two things; the first was that the Japanese can grow afros - quite impressive ones at that, and the second was that in the 125 pound division, which is so little heard about due to lack of explosive finishes or big names, KOs can happen. I happened to discover Yamaguchi through his fight in Shooto with Stonnie Dennis, which Yamaguchi finished by establishing the Thai clinch on Dennis' neck, pushing him into the ropes, and knocking him out cold with a beautiful head kick.





Yamaguchi's hands are as fast an furious as you'd expect from a flyweight fighter, and his kicks are heavy, but what is most interesting about Yamaguchi to die hard fans is that he, just as Anderson Silva has done, has negated the majority of his opponent's takedown attempts through mastery of the clinch from a striking perspective. Watch his destruction of Frank Baca as the latter struggles to gain underhooks on the smaller, craftier Yamaguchi.




This article continues with some more top notch flyweight KOs at http://www.headkicklegend.com/2012/1/27/2752523/great-and-obscure-strikers-1-mamoru-yamaguchi

The Striker's Reading List: Part 1

In the martial arts and in combative sports today there is a terrible absence of strategy on most parts. We see fighters come out and stand directly in front of each other, walking straight in with combinations and hoping that at least something lands. Traditional martial arts for the most part aren't any better, for all the philosophizing that most karateka, tae kwon do and kung fu practitioners do, they still choose to throw techniques almost at random against each other. Throwing muck at the walls and hoping that some of it sticks. Below I have listed some of my favourite books which changed my view regarding the martial arts and fighting.

For part 1 of this list I have attempted to focus on books which are relatively readily attainable. Rarer ones will appear in later editions.

The Heart of Karate-Do by Shigeru Egami
I was saddened to learn that since I bought my copy over ten years ago this wonderful book has gone out of print. Coming initially from a Shotokan Karate background this book changed everything for me. My entire life I'd seen karate practitioners stomping up and down the dojo, straining and tensing so much in search of "kime" ('focus', thought in many schools to be the tensing of all the muscles in the body) and suddenly Egami was telling me to forget all that and relax. I was pretty young at the time and this, to me, was revolutionary - but the more I heeded Egami's advice the more my karate improved.

Egami was the top disciple of Gichin Funakoshi (founder of the Shotokan school) but never found the fame outside of Japan that his juniors Mas Oyama and Masatoshi Nakayama did. In his youth he trained with tremendous zeal and was concerned so much with "Ikken Hisatsu" or killing with a single blow that he began actively experimenting on himself. Over his life he estimated that he took over 10,000 punches to the abdomen in search of someone who could come close to his ideal technique. He eventually settled on training a single knuckle fist to the highest level - and the feats ascribed to him in his time are incredible. I highly recommend that anyone from a traditional martial arts background, or fighters hoping to learn something deeper, pick this book up.

Favorite Part:  Egami was decades ahead of his day in many ways and ultimately steered me towards MMA when he declared that true Karate involves not only punching but elbowing, kneeing and "even wrestling with the opponent".

Buy it here


The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi
You knew it was going to appear here because you've heard a hundred times before how life changing this book is. This text highlights how true martial arts genius is being able to break with the norm - Musashi was the first man to wield the two swords ,which samurai used to wear, simultaneously -  but it also shows that it took years for Musashi to receive recognition as anything but a thug, and the same lack of acceptance likely awaits anyone who attempts anything radically new in the martial arts. Musashi was heavily influenced by Zen Buddhism but was also a man of unwavering practicality, and this makes for both a deeply useful and thought provoking read.

The text is called "The Book of Five Rings" because it is divided into five parts; Earth, Water, Fire, Wind and Emptiness. Earth and Water speak exclusively of the tactics and technique of one on one swordsmanship, but much of it can be as easily applied to unarmed fighting. The Book of Fire is concerned more with all encompassing strategies, ones which apply equally to one on one combat as they do to a battle between two armies. Wind is a critique of the methods existing in Musashi's day, and Void gives an insight into Musashi's world view, his opinion on knowledge, Mushin (empty mindedness) and other such philosophical matters. That this book is required reading in martial arts schools and business schools across the world is a testament to it's significance. In this day and age, with all of Musashi's knowledge so readily available and so cheaply, there is no real excuse not to have read this one.

Favorite Part: 'It is difficult to move strong things by pushing directly, so you should
"injure the corners" ... In single combat, it is easy to win once the enemy collapses. This happens
when you injure the "corners" of his body, and thus weaken him.' This applies perfectly to the strategy of  kicking the opponent's legs, as effective in MMA today as it would have been 1000 years ago.

Buy it here

Boxing's Ten Commandments by Alan Lachica
This is the least terrible modern boxing text, and by a significant amount. There are actually some decent ideas in here; an entire chapter on angles that is actually about angles and not just nonsense with "angles" as a buzz word. The V-step suggested in the angles chapter is a neat little trick where one fakes a rear hand punch accompanied with a half step in from the back foot, then immediately steps it out to the side, acquiring a dominant angle. A lot of the pages are made up of simple, interchangeable combinations such as "1-2-3" then "1-2-3(body)" and "1-2(body)-3", but between this there are flashes of brilliance.

Favorite Part: The large section on angles. V-steps, C-steps and so on all displayed beautifully in photographs and ready to try at your next sparring session.

Buy it here

Fedor by Fedor Emelianenko
I picked this book up hoping to learn more about Fedor's brilliant Sambo and Judo trips and throws. Though I wasn't disappointed on the Judo front, I was taken aback by the scope and quality of the section provided by Fedor on striking. It is very easy to forget that Emelianenko, regarded by anyone with an ounce of sense in the MMA community as the best rounded and most dominant heavyweight fighter of all time, spent a great deal of his career training with kickboxing legend, Ernesto Hoost in Holland. Though he rarely kicked in his prime days (he is bringing them back more recently, with vicious effect), Fedor's understanding of all around stand up is largely unparalleled.

The most impressive thing about this text is that unlike Anderson Silva's book, which is largely made up of filler material that 'The Spider' has not used in his career, all the techniques present in Fedor have been used by the man against top competition. Present is the hand trap to left hook that he finished Zuluzinho and Tim Sylvia with, the Kimura escape which allowed him to give Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira submissions in order to break free and strike him more cleanly, and the counters that the Russian used against Mirko Cro Cop's legendary kicks.

Favorite Part: Fedor's backstepping punches are a thing of beauty. He shows how to step backwards and off line with the lead foot, while simulteneously throwing a left hook or uppercut as the opponent advances. A technique he used to floor Kelly Schall in RINGS.

Buy it here



Boxing Simplified by John J. Walsh AND Boxing by Edwin Haislet
The two best books on boxing out there, these put all recent publications on the manly art to shame. The rival coaches of the most successful high school boxing teams in the USA, they essentially alternated ownership of national titles in their hay day. John Walsh's contains photographs where Haislet's only contains drawings due to the fact that Walsh's was written 20 years later, but both are fantastic. Haislet covers the 8 basic attacking combinations, the safety lead and the 8 basic counters for the jab, where Walsh covers his counters for these strategies.

Favorite Part: With a little searching you can find these online for FREE. They are worth more than every recent boxing book published combined and they're not even going to cost you. If every MMA fighter read even half of one of these books, the sport would be a much more technical one.


The Tao of Jeet Kune Do by Bruce Lee
Another man who forged his own path in the martial arts, breaking with tradition. This book covers all that went on in Bruce's head as he was forced into a hospital bed for an extended period by a spine injury. Were it not for this spine injury Lee's early death would have prevented us from learning so much from a man who studied it all and cut off all the fat. The philosophy and tactics on display in this book are well worth the price tag, and it is readily available almost anywhere. This is another that there is no excuse for not reading.

Favorite Part: Bruce covers in great depth his theory that a right handed man should fight as a southpaw, which was revolutionary at the time. Yet Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, Mirko Cro Cop, Takanori Gomi, Kid Yamamoto and Nick Diaz have all had enormous success as right handers by fighting southpaw in recent years. Lee was almost a prophet!

Buy it here

Cross Counter 2: Gif Madness

After the massive success of my article on the cross counter fight fans began coming out of the woodwork on forums everywhere and showing me their favorite instances of the technique being employed. Here are a couple that I really enjoyed. As a reminder, the classical cross counter is an overhand thrown over the top of an opponent's jab and is regarded as the most effective counter punch in boxing, and not the straight right hand as is thought today.

Here is a superb application by K-1 Max and Shootboxing legend, Andy Souwer against Gago Drago. The cross counter punctuated a classic Souwer clinic in kickboxing, and while he is not known for his punching power, a perfectly timed counter-strike like this will end anyone's night.






Here is one of Overeem's against Ben Edwards from the original article. As you can see he lands beautifully as over Ben's attack and sends him sprawling to the mat like a sack filled with vegetable soup.










This gif of Machida's loss to Shogun shows largely the cost of tactical errors at the highest level of the game. In their 6 rounds of combat Machida and Shogun were pretty much at a stale mate as each one fired back a counter to the other man's counters. Machida landed a solid springing knee (case study of the Machida knee coming soon!) and got too confident in the pocket with a much better brawler. Following immediately with a left straight (from a southpaw stance) Machida was met with a cross counter from Shogun which caught his temple and took him out of the fight.




In this gif Jen's Pulver, in his young and terrifying days, lands a cross counter on John Lewis who is clearly timid and attempting to "establish the jab" against the undersized lightweight king. Pulver can likely see the tentativeness of his opponent as clearly as we do in this grainy gif, isn't bothered and simply socks him over the top. That's comfort that only experience can bring.








Here is BJ Penn throwing an interesting variation where he ducks the left hand of Sanchez (a vastly inferior striker who threw the same combination repeatedly at the exclusion of everything else against Penn) and comes up with the right hook - a truly difficult punch to land at the top level, and beautifully done by BJ. An article on the right hook will be coming at some point I assure you all!






A final cross counter, by the king of the cross counter (seriously, I could make an entire page of just his - and might) Joe Louis. Here the gigantic Primo "The Ambling Alp" Carnera has been circling to his left while bolt upright and jabbing all fight (take note Michael Bisping) and Louis clocks him over the top in the sixth round, heralding the beginning of the end for the big Italian.

Counter Jabbing

New article up on HKL








Part one can be found at:http://www.headkicklegend.com/2012/1/19/2718349/jack-slacks-striking-guide-the-jab-offensive








The Counter Jab is perhaps the most important punch in boxing and therefore in all around striking, it lands cleanly and often, and it is by far the safest counter punch to throw. Supposedly good strikers have been taken apart time and again by lesser strikers who counter jab often and accurately. There are many variations of the counter jab, but by far the most useful are the catch and pitch, and the dipping jab. The catch and pitch jab is a simple matter of using the right palm to catch an incoming jab while firing one's own jab simultaneously. The dipping jab is the act of slipping to the outside of the opponent's jab while simultaneously throwing one's own.


The former technique of catch and pitch is demonstrated here by the great Joe Louis


via gifsoup.com


Notice how Louis initiates his jab immediately upon his opponent's front foot entering punching range. Louis was not a fast mover, and it really showed as most of his opponents spent the early rounds running in and out of range, so it was these kind of well timed pot shots at long range that Louis used to slow them down before stepping into range for his violent hooking and uppercutting combinations. Watch in this gif as he grinds down Mann, a fighter who had begun the fight by attempting to rush Louis. Louis brought Mann under his control with a counter jab every time Mann attempted to fight from long range.


Continues after the Jump





Continue reading this post »

The Subtle Skills of Joe Louis

A brilliant video put together by Monte Cox of CoxsCorner.com, 6 minutes long but still barely scratches the surface of Louis' bag of tricks.

Jack Slack's Guide to the Jab: Offense

Brand new piece up at HeadKickLegend.com!

http://www.headkicklegend.com/2012/1/19/2718349/jack-slacks-striking-guide-the-jab-offensive

Jack

Big News! Twitter Account!

Big news - for me at least. I FINALLY got a Twitter account.

Add me: @JackSlackMMA

and never miss an update again!

New HeadKick Legend Article up

The third and final part in my series on angles for HeadKickLegend:


http://www.headkicklegend.com/2012/1/17/2713424/angles-in-striking-part-3-from-above

UFC 143 Diaz vs Condit Preview

Just a guest article that I did for the nice folks at CagePotato evaluating the striking styles and abilities of Carlos Condit and Nick Diaz ahead of their fight in a couple of weeks.

http://www.cagepotato.com/ufc-143-striking-breakdown-nick-diaz-vs-carlos-condit/

The Way It Was: Louis vs Walcott

Just a documentary I came across the other day which details the two matches between Joe Louis, the best technical heavyweight who ever lived, and Jersey Joe Walcott, perhaps the craftiest. Definitely worth a look, if only for Joe Walcott's bizarre cakewalks, stance switches and side stepping counter right hands. The sequence starting at 0:11 sums up these fights in a moment; Joe Louis stalking Walcott like he has so many other heavyweights but not knowing quite what to do with him, then getting dropped by a huge right hand seemingly out of nowhere.

Ezzard Charles - Sweet Scientist

Was browsing through some old Jersey Joe Walcott matches the other day (more analysis on him to come) and found this excellent little breakdown of some of Ezzard Charles' old school techniques by boxari1980. All credit goes to him / her and I think you'll all learn a little more about analysing fight film and even a couple of new techniques from watching this!

Technique number 2 - Charles' right hand lead - will doubtlessly appear in a future article as I love any way a fighter can land his right hand first to confuse his opponent.

High Kicking: How It's Done

High kicks are the Holy Grail of martial arts and landing them consistently secures superstar status for a kickboxer or mixed martial artist just as well as a knockout punch does in boxing. There is something uniquely impressive about watching a head kick master such as Mirko 'Cro Cop' Filipovic send an opponent's head snapping sideways and their body crumpling to the ring canvas. As frightening in it's effects upon the recipient as it is an awe inspiring feat of flexibility and explosiveness meeting perfect timing; a perfect high kick in a major promotion will be viewed millions of times on Youtube and propel the kicker into title contention in at least the fans' minds.

No man has done more for the publicity of the high roundhouse kick than Mirko Cro Cop; his head kick wins over Igor Vovchancyn, Wanderlei Silva and Aleksander Emelianenko fill highlight reels all over the internet. Cro Cop's head kick is interesting because, unlike the later entries on this list, he never off balances his opponent with a push to bring their hands down (the Peter Aerts method), he simply kicks them in the head from outfighting range. Cro Cop, a southpaw, lacked the slick combinations of other strikers and would have been a simple one trick pony if he had not developed two other techniques to prime form; his left straight punch and his left body kick. Through the use of his straight left punch - which was strong enough to fracture Bob Sapp, Josh Barnett and Kazushi Sakuraba's orbital bones (the latter two from his knees on the ground) - Cro Cop was able to make his opponents forget their strict right hand position - which every opponent held rigidly in defence of the side of their head at the start of their meeting with him. Through his left body kick Cro Cop was able to mop up against the disciplined opponents who kept their hand up at all costs.

Watching this extremely short fight against world class striker and MMA fighter Igor Vovchancyn, it is clear how disconcerting just a couple of Cro Cop's left straights are. Igor comes out of his corner looking disciplined, with his right hand up high and away from his head to soften Mirko's kicks, but just a minute later he is bringing it in after being stung by Mirko's straight. Mirko doesn't even need the hand completely out of the way, as he is content to kick through the less sturdy guard Igor presents.




Here, in Japan's premier kickboxing promotion, K1, Mirko fights New Zealand's Mark Hunt. A former Grand Prix champion who got by on his huge punch and having arguably the best chin in combat sports history, Hunt was able to take the full force of Mirko's kick and get up, but Mirko's set up was picture perfect and the clip has made an appearance in dozens of highlight reels. Hunt's defense has improved somewhat when he meets Mirko and it gives the Croat trouble throughout the fight, but Hunt's attempts to utilize better head movement to evade punches backfire when Cro Cop catches him getting into a pattern. Notice at 5:43 as Cro Cop fakes to attack with the straight, Hunt goes to fire back but pulls short when he realizes that Cro Cop is in position to defend. Mirko immediately fakes again and Hunt leans to his right to slip the straight left. Mirko's left straight and left high kick require the same step with the lead foot outside of the opponent's lead foot, meaning that by conditioning an opponent to expect a straight punch when Cro Cop steps, he can instead throw a high kick without his opponent seeing the foot being placed in position as a telegraphing of the technique. In the most effective cases he can convince the opponent to duck into the kick, just as Hunt does.

Marlon Sandro fell foul of the same mistake in Bellator FC. Sandro is a world class featherweight with phenomenal power, but lacks the technical finesse of the featherweight division's other strikers. Here he makes the mistake against the seemingly overmatched Pat Curran of believing that his defense is as world class as his offense - his overactive head movement and wild sways down to almost hip height get him caught by a high kick with plenty of follow through on it.

Here Mirko picks up another easy knockout from an opponent so concerned with parrying his punches, while simultaneously so inexperienced in doing so, that Mirko can simply kick around his opponent's outstretched arms. Notice in the slow motion replay at the end of this very short clip how Cro Cop doesn't even throw the left straight but instead reaches inside of his opponent's right hand and turns his hand outward, cupping Nagata's wrist until he knows it won't get back in time to stop the kick. A nice little trick from the high kick master which is worth investing the time to learn.

Much of Cro Cop's success with the high kick however can also be attributed to his impeccable flexibility and athleticism. Indeed, as Mirko aged the knockouts began to disappear, and head kicks were almost always blocked by opponents he would have finished in minutes during his prime. Cro Cop's hip flexibility was always stunning, and Bas Rutten observed that it was this flexibility which made it difficult for opponents to discern whether his kick was coming in at leg height, rib height or head height. Peter Aerts is a phenomenal head kicker who has never been known for his flexibility, and he accomplishes his kicks largely (though not exclusively) through the use of off balancing techniques. Watch at 2:06 of this classic K-1 match as Aerts pushes his opponent away from him hard, causing his opponent to drop his hands instinctively to keep his balance. While it would be hard to punch a man that you have just pushed away, a kick is much longer and does not require you to draw back your hands, so it is possible to begin the kick almost simultaneously with the push.

To finish, I'll offer another nice application of the push away head kick seen in the Aerts match above. Here Bantamweight striking master Mamoru 'The Fro' Yamaguchi slows down the fast starting American, Stonnie Dennis in the clinch, before achieving a double handed neck clinch, pushing him onto the ropes and knocking him unconscious with a beautiful high kick. As you can see at 1:42, when Yamaguchi pushes him away Stonnie's hands are in no position to defend himself as he is correcting his balance, making the kick as simple as aiming at his temple.

Second article for HeadKickLegend.com!

Hi folks! Thanks for all the support, we've been averaging 400 views a day and 1000 on good days! =)

I have posted a second article on the front page of HeadKickLegend.com and when it drops off there you can see it by going to:

http://www.headkicklegend.com/2012/1/9/2693447/angles-in-striking-2-from-below

TheHistorian

New article on Headkicklegend

My first front page piece can be seen on  http://www.headkicklegend.com/  under the name Jack Slack.

Please head over and check it out, it's still quite a small site but the authors there are brilliant and the site is well worth bookmarking!

Cheers,

TheHistorian

Deaner from Fubar at Wrongbar!

Deaner from Fubar is going to be playing March 16th at Wrongbar in Toronto. Anyone who was at the Midnight Madness World Premiere of Fubar II in 2010 will for sure remember what a rocking night that was.



Here is the link for all the 411 on the show. http://www.songkick.com/concerts/11026473-deaner-of-fubar-at-wrongbar

Hagler vs. Hearns

Just the classic tear up, not much else to say!

Two fighters, two different styles, two high KO ratios against top competition, two amazing rounds of action.

The Lever Punch or Doubling Up

Doubling up is the act of throwing two successive blows with the same hand, and can be extended into tripling up, quadrupling up or to any number imaginable - limited only by speed, ambition and arm cramp. The term Lever Punch or Crowbar punch was coined by Soviet Boxing Team Head Coach K. V. Gradapolov in his "Tactics of the Foreign Masters" to describe the legendary black pugilist Peter Jackson's seemingly unique tactic of throwing a hard left hook and without drawing his shoulders back completely throwing another one immediately afterward. This action served to break the opponents guard and concentration as after a hard left hook a hard right punch is almost always expected. The second punch did not matter much to Jackson who simply used it to "lever" open some space in which to fire his powerful right hand, but in recent years it has been possible for the second or third successive punch off of one hand to be used as a damaging blow. A brilliant example of "doubling up" or "lever punches" is Manny Pacquiao's fight with David Diaz:

Manny Pacquiao throughout his career had experienced the advantage of being a southpaw - awkward and unseen by most fighters with savvy managers. Against Diaz he fought another southpaw - effectively neutralizing Pacquiao's ability to lead with his left hand. As a southpaw against an orthodox fighter it becomes a contest of power punches seemingly as both sides find it much easier to land a straight with their rear hand (usually their power hand) than with their jab. Jabbing in a contest involving a southpaw and an orthodox fighter is usually largely ineffective unless one participant fights with their lead hand and shoulder down as Diego Sanchez made the mistake of doing against Martin Kampmann a few months back. In this fight Manny had to prove he could fight with his lead hand, and he did it VERY convincingly. At 0:25 Pacquiao uses a slapping lead hook to jump to the side of Diaz, following it with a short uppercut off of the same hand, bringing Diaz's head up for a hook off of his rear, left hand. Manny lands a lead uppercut to the body followed immediately by a lead uppercut to the head at 0:38. By not bringing his hand back to his guard in between Manny is able to bring the punch through Diaz's blind angle, the point down by his feet that he cannot see through his peripheral vision, and so the punch lands with surprise and good effect. Emmanuel Steward - a far wiser man than most in combat sports - breaks down the combination in slow motion at 1:00 noting it's rarity even in modern boxing. Pacquiao again doubles up later in the fight, this time using a jab to lead uppercut combination that lands flush at 1:43 of the video.


Another beautiful example of doubling up from the boxing world is Mike Tyson's famous combination of the jab, rear hook to the body and rear uppercut. He used this to effectively finish tough British heavyweight and all around nice guy, Frank Bruno. At 9:37 Mike has had Bruno reeling but has failed to finish by swarming on him, so he takes a step back and reconsiders his strategy. Pushing Bruno against the ropes he sinks the right hook to the body and immediately follows up with the right uppercut. Again as the punch had started down by Bruno's trunks, Tyson's uppercut was not telegraphed in the usual way by his glove leaving his own chin and dropping below his shoulders.




The professional kickboxer and K-1 superstar Gokhan Saki has some of the fastest hands in his division, also being one of the smallest men in it. Gokhan Saki throws some of the most inventive combinations of any fighter in the world, let alone at heavyweight. In his fight with "Flashy" Freddy Kamayo, he completely outshone his opponent and upstaged Kamayo's moniker by throwing heavyweight power in lightweight combinations. At 0:55 he throws a jab, cross, left hook to the head and a left hook to the body, following it with a hard low kick, and Freddy's night only gets worse from there. After stunning Kamayo with a solid counter hook, Saki follows him to the ropes and immediately begins using smoke and mirrors to baffle his opponent rather than swinging wildly for the finish. At 2:03 Saki quadruples up by throwing a left hook to the body, a left uppercut (through the blind angle) and a double left hook to the head in rapid succession. At 2:31 Saki tops off his performance by tripling up with his left hand, throwing a right hand, tripling up the left hand again, then rolling his left hand over his opponent's head, using it to rip down Kamayo's left glove and land a right hand that sends Freddy sprawling across the canvas. Kamayo is game and makes it to his feet but the damage is done and a stoppage follows seconds later.

Mention is needed for how this underused tool appears in MMA. It is rare that you see it used but when it is, it almost always scores and I believe that fighters will pick up on this soon. The Diaz brothers, Nate and Nick are exceptional at throwing multiple punches off of one hand in quick succession. Nick's hands are so hyperactive throughout the fight (though in a strangely slow rhythm) that I won't even attempt to pin point all of the double ups he performs but I'll observe a few just to illustrate the point. At 4:00, 4:15, 6:48, 9:51 and 9:53 and 9:54 Diaz throws two punches off of the same hand in rapid succession. There are numerous other examples of doubling up in this half of the fight alone, but good luck counting. Diaz's work rate is incomparable and on most of the occasions he doubles up a punch one of the two lands, and by the 9:50 mark both are landing.

A few honourable mentions: Takanori Gomi was a fierce MMA puncher in his prime and doubled up to great extent against the (on paper at least) much better striker Jens Pulver - using a lead hook to the body to bend Pulver towards the following lead hook to the head. Fedor Emelianenko also used a beautiful combination against Mirko Cro Cop that consisted of a right straight to the southpaws sternum, a left uppercut to meet him as he bent forward and a left hook to loop around Cro Cop's guard as he attempted to defend himself.

Finally no article on doubling up would be complete without a mention of Roy Jones Jr., I am not even going to attempt to offer individual times for this video as I believe anyone who hasn't seen it should watch the entire three minutes; it's pretty inspiring. If you're really pushed for time just forward to the end, but you'll be missing some of the best left hook work in boxing history.

Punch and Clutch

'Punch and Clutch' is a term you hear from veteran commentators and coaches from time to time and is a rather old school strategy of punishing an opponent without giving him the chance to counter with combinations or outpoint you. While many times you will hear the term used in a derogatory way; criticizing a fighter who is clearly trying to stall, properly executed punch and clutch makes for exciting, brutal fights. Punch and Clutch is a method wherein a power punch can be thrown without fear of retaliation. Normally a looping right lead or a powerful left hook is thrown and the clinch is established immediately after.  Floyd Mayweather is not a big puncher, but can cause damage by jumping into his shots and clinching. Take a look at this short highlight of his right hand leads against the southpaw Sharmba Mitchell. At 0:09 he lands a huge right hand and immediately moves to clinch, smothering Mitchell's counter. At 0:15 he does the same again, this time dropping Mitchell, but he is clearly already moving in for the clinch, watching the slow motion replay one can clearly see him react and change stances to punch again.

This is not something he does only against southpaws either (he's fought so few of them). Watch his performance against Hatton, a much harder puncher and an expert infighter, whom he managed to land power shots on and tie up with ease in the middle and later rounds of their contest. Watch at 1:29 where he throws the right hand, leaping in to clinch with Hatton, then when Hatton attempts to hold him, Floyd cross faces him and lands some free shots on the way out.

The first time I recall hearing the term was in reference to Roberto Duran's strategy. During Duran's lightweight career he was known as a ferocious power puncher (hence his nickname Manos de Piedra or 'Hands of Stone') and he managed to carry this punching power up in weight to extent.  While an extremely able boxer with world class defense, Duran's management decided while he was young to sell his punching power above all else and asked him to assure his popularity by scoring knockouts rather than clinical decision victories. To achieve this without sacrificing his facial features or mental faculties Duran made sure that when he threw his enormous right hand he clinched up immediately after. Should his opponent cover up he began berating them with hooks and uppercuts, if they clinched back he freed one hand and began uppercutting them anyway. Two more spectacular Punch and Clutchers are Naseem Hamed and Roy Jones - both of whom got remarkable power on their shots even in the lower weightclasses, primarily by commiting their whole body weight to them and either ducking or clinching immediately after.

Punch and Clutch is especially useful in Muay Thai, kickboxing and MMA due to the fact that a fighter needs neither hand free to strike and in the latter can throw his opponent to the floor. Here is a clip of Ernesto Hoost, pushing 40 years old, beating his third world class opponent in one night at the K-1 Grand Prix. In the first minute and a half it becomes obvious to Hoost his opponent is much stronger than him and is constantly applying pressure - Hoost attempts one of his trade mark low kicks and is pushed off balance into the ropes at 0:40. At 1:17 he attempts to punch and clutch but Le Banner muscles him off. The same happens at 2:22 and at 2:28. But on both of those occasions Le Banner is so concerned about keeping Hoost from clinching him so that he can get a punch off, that Hoost actually lands all his attempted right hand leads. He does again at 2:55 and 2:57 and each time Le Banner is caught because he is attempting to keep Hoost from clinching him. By the second round Hoost is tying him up more often - even landing knees as at 4:48. From the 6:00 mark Hoost is landing his right hand and clinching up immediately after at will, and Le Banner is clearly tiring from being hit and attempting to muscle the older man off of him. Le Banner's slowing movement allows Hoost the space to move back and use his kicks, such as at 6:42. Hoost is eventually given a yellow card for clinching - but his gameplan has already succeeded in exhausting the enormous Frenchman. Le Banner cannot pressure his opponent in the third for lack of energy and fear of Hoost's Punch and Clutch - at which point Hoost backs him onto the ropes for the first time with a salvo of punches. Hoost's right kick breaks Le Banner's arm and the fight is stopped - making Ernesto Hoost the oldest man to ever win the K-1 Grand Prix by tiring out a younger, stronger opponent. All through use of Punch and Clutch.


Finally an example from the world of Mixed Martial Arts. There are few who combine clinchwork and boxing so well as Fedor Emelianenko did in his prime and so I will illustrate using him. Fedor's third meeting with Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira is a clinic in Punch and Clutch. Using his fearsome right hand lead the Russian repeatedly forces Nogueira to 1) raise his hands and expose his waste or 2) take a huge punch and not be aware of Fedor taking him down. Take a look at this handy highlight Cyrax1984 has put together:

At 0:05 and 0:12 Emelianenko uses his right hand lead to upper body clinch to throw combination. And again at 0:27, and with a different throw at 0:31. At 0:20 he instead uses a strong jab but immediately steps in and puts his head on Nogueira's chest. It makes a great difference from the jab to double leg shot that seems to still be the only set up used by anyone outside of Georges St. Pierre today.


A final brilliant example is from Fedor's fight with Gary Goodridge. I advise anyone who hasn't seen this to watch the fight first in fast motion, be amazed, then watch the slow motion and see what Fedor does. Goodridge is well prepared for Fedor to take him down as he has done to Semmy Schilt, Heath Herring and Nogueira. At 3:50 the slow motion picks up with Fedor landing his left hook, but having jumped in far enough to be able to clinch - as Goodridges arms extend to initiate the clinch Fedor pushes Goodridge off of him, offbalancing Goodridge, causing his hands to drop and allowing Fedor to land a second, harder hook at 3:52. In using Punch and Clutch it is up to the fighter to use his judgement just as Mayweather did when he realised Mitchell was hurt or that Hatton wanted to hold him. If Emelianenko hadn't felt the first hook land cleanly, I suspect in all likelihood that he would have continued into a full clinch and secured a takedown, but instead he chose to land more blows upon realizing he had struck Goodridge cleanly.

The Cross Counter

Some techniques get better with age, like a fine wine, and the Cross Counter is certainly one of them. The term "cross" has some to mean a straight right hand to the head, when in fact it originally referred to a right hook combined with a slip to the left - or what is commonly termed an "overhand".

Unlike the modern overhand we see utilized in Mixed Martial Arts by inexperienced strikers, the Cross Counter is designed to place your head inside of your opponent's jab so that your looping punch can travel over the top of his extended arm. The move came to prominence under the great Joe Gans but had existed even before he began fighting in the late 1890s. In the Spalding athletic library's first volume on boxing - guest written in part by the first gloved heavyweight champion John L. Sullivan - a great many variations of the Cross Counter are given. Here is a picture from the longtime Soviet boxing team head coach K. V. Gradapolov's book "Tactics of Foreign Masters". Gans is on the right, performing his cross counter over an opponent's jab.

The overhand has been called the great equalizer, but in truth the Cross Counter is even more dangerous. As so many top boxers and fighters have been taught to "establish the jab", it is almost certain that a fighter will open 90% of his combinations with a jab. A great many competitors who have been overmatched on paper have been able to land spectacular knockout blows on a complacent "scientific boxer" through the use of the Cross Counter from the opening bell.

For those Mixed Martial Arts fans among you, many of you will be familiar with Aleksander Emelianenko - the younger brother of heavyweight demi-god, Fedor and one of the most frightening boxers in MMA. Despite destroying fighters like Sergei Kharitanov and Pedro Rizzo, and being competitive with Mirko Cro Cop, Aleks was still knocked out quite recently by the first punch his opponent threw. Magomed Malikov, a relative nobody - comes out bubbling with nervous energy and obviously lacks the comfort which Aleks feels in the stand up game. From the start it is also clear that Magomed is waiting for Aleks to step into range, which he fakes several times. As soon as Aleks commits to stepping in however, Magomed cracks him with the Cross Counter over Aleks' jab.

Many of you will also be familiar with Alistair Overeem's overhand or Cross Counter. In his match with Ben Edwards, Alistair showed enormous improvement in his boxing game from his previous performances, where his over-reliance on knee strikes led to the K-1 organization (unfairly in this fan's opinion) banning the Thai clinch. Notice at 1:30 and 20 seconds later at 1:50 how Overeem uses his head movement coincided with a huge right hook to catch Edwards while he's jabbing. The beauty of the Cross Counter is that it can be landed after the jab has landed if the opponent is slow to draw it back, as at 1:30, or as the jab comes out, as at 1:50.

Many call the overhand a sloppy punch; but I implore those among you who look on it like that as an offensive weapon to consider it's context. When thrown as a lead or as part of a combination, the overhand is pretty telegraphed and amateurish, but when a lead is drawn out of the opponent and the Cross Counter employed, the overhand suddenly becomes the most dangerous weapon in a striker's arsenal.

Tyson's Crazy Right Hook

Greetings and welcome to this blog wherein I hope you'll join me delving through the archives of boxing, kickboxing and other combative sports' greatest fights. I hope to provide a good number of tear ups for those fans who love back and forth action, and a few technical breakdowns of some of the greatest finishes and techniques of all time. Everything stated on this blog is absolutely my own opinion or interpretation and I stand to be corrected by readers, and would love to hear the views of all those who make their way here on the footage I link.

    A Mike Tyson knockout is a good way to start any day - viewing one that is. Maintaining one of the highest knockout ratios of any fighter, the stocky heavyweight is one of the best known and most divisive personalities in boxing history for good reason. The second match in Tyson's comeback following release from prison in 1995 for rape charges,  Mathis was undefeated at the time of the fight and gave Mike some problems in the first and second round, but only in so far as remaining on his feet against Tyson's fury.

While Tyson's comeback is remembered mainly for Mike's abandonment of the slick combinations, head movement and footwork that made him so fearsome in his prime; this fight had a couple of truly phenomenal moments. Those with more than a passing familiarity with striking martial arts or the sweet science will be well familiar with the term "angles". Angles, referred to seemingly constantly by colour commentators but are rarely used in the modern boxing game, are a position where a fighter can land blows on his opponent without them being able to throw back at him. If an opponent acquires an angle on a fighter, the latter has no choice but to 1) back off, or 2) turn to face his opponent again, leaving time and space for the former to punch him.

Mike's angle in this fight is one you'll rarely see used. At 0:24 and 2:15 Tyson leaps to his opponent's right side, switching into a southpaw stance and loading up an enormous right hook. While moving into an opponent's right hand is not encouraged by most good coaches, Mathis is squared up so that he cannot put much power behind his right hand, and Tyson is able to move safely past his opponent's right shoulder; leaving Mathis to simply cover up. Surviving the first attempt through his wits alone, Mathis is too slow to adjust the second time and is sent sprawling to the canvas by one of the finest unique blows I've ever witnessed.