Hey chaps,
Third part of the Anderson Silva series, this one will focus on perhaps my favourite of Anderson's performances, the two fights against Rich Franklin. I hope you enjoy it and as always, all critique is welcomed! If you really enjoy it, please feel free to copy this post to other forums (obviously not the whole article, BE management get angry!) but I could use the publicity! =)
Cheers,
Jack
With UFC 147 and UFC 148 looming in the near future, we are about to see some of the best middeweights in MMA history fight once more in the twilight of their careers. Anderson Silva is near universally recognized by fight fans as one of the best athletes MMA has to offer and Rich Franklin may be the forgotten man in terms of how well he did and for how long he did so. Both men have given us some of the best moments in fight history.
In my previous two Judo Chops of Anderson Silva, we looked at his counter jab and high kick against Yushin Okami in Part 1, and in Part 2, his counter right hook against Forrest Griffin. In this edition, we will examine his performances against Rich Franklin, then thought to be the best middleweight in the world. This Judo Chop will cover specifically his use of the Muay Thai plum position - or both hands behind the head, on the base of the skull.
One of the interesting things about the entire Anderson Silva phenomenon has been the amount that fans forget based on hype. Anderson Silva has NOT always been a great fighter, in fact during his PRIDE run he was a pretty mediocre fighter, pulling out a couple of decent wins and a couple of losses to poor opposition. It is the fact that so much of Anderson's skill has been acquired through intelligence and hard work, rather than being god-given, that makes him such an incredible figure.
Silva's striking, like the rest of his game, has improved continuously throughout his career. Nowadays, Anderson is known as possibly the best boxer in MMA. Ridiculous assertions about a match with Roy Jones Jr. aside (which Silva would not come out of well even against the Jones of today), it is hard to argue against Silva's boxing skill in an MMA context. He was not always so smooth with his hands, however.
In fact against Franklin, Silva's head movement was absent (aside from his dance toward the end of the first round of their second meeting) and Franklin landed most of the best punches outside of clinching range. Anderson came out in almost a pure Muay Thai mindset; his hands high and reaching to parry Franklin's blows. Certainly, it was Silva's plan to stand firm and get into the clinch, but for much of the time spent standing in their bouts, Franklin was actually doing slightly better than Silva from a pure kickboxing perspective.
It should be noted that while Rich Franklin's stand up is not brilliant from the perspective of body mechanics, and he often seems wooden, he is very much an intelligent striker. Combining this with a good all around game, and great conditioning is what made Franklin shine in a very unexciting division. For instance, against Evan Tanner, both men crossed their feet when circling, either man could have been knocked to the floor with a strong low kick or even a well timed foot sweep or punch, this is a first few days of kickboxing error. Franklin does, however, make up for this by doing more interesting things, such as throwing an overhand style lead hook which catches many opponents off guard, dipping when he jabs, and hooking off of the jab - a move that only boxing old timers perform regularly today. All are fairly high level strategic maneuvers.
After the jump we will look in detail at just how Anderson used the Thai Plum to overwhelm the crafty Rich Franklin.
http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/6/20/3096644/ufc-148-judo-chop-anderson-silva-rich-franklin-chael-sonnen-thai-plum-analyzing-mma-technique
