saw the interview where florian said he spent a lot of time training "defensive wrestling" with good wrestlers.
Reminds me of the fighters that talk about trainning "sub defense" when fighting BJJers.
Is that the right way to train? If you learn only half of the game wouldnt that leave big gaps in your knowlege on how to fight against a wrestler or BJJer?
he does pretty well for himself.
he sure does. but he did not look too good in this fight after training extensivly in wrestling.
did he even go for a takedown? I dont remember
well, that's why he trained 'defensive wrestling'. his goal was to stop the td. unfortunately, the fight ended up looking like serra/lytle. not entertaining at all.
unfortunately, kenflo is dying for a title shot, so he fights the top of the heep. that tends to be wrestlers.
luckily, lytle fights guys that want to bang, so he delivers!
Being a defensive wrestler is not good I wrestled for 12 years and was always taught the best defense is a good offense 
it seems by being defensive anything you are just preparing yourself to deal with a bad position. Even BJJ instructors tell you that. At least if you study the whole game you not only give yourself the option of shooting, but also get a different perspective on what you are trying to defend. I mean, florian had his problems with sherk and that was a long time ago. Im actually really suprised to hear the words "training defensive wrestling" come out of his mouth.
And just fucking scramble a bit you know?!!!
look at sakuraba's style of wrestling. Dude was quick but fought people a lot stronger than him. for him it was all about the an ankle. then he was just methodical and skillful in gaining the position.
but what worked to his advantage was that he had maybe the number 1 or 2 sub game in the division so the last thing his opponent wanted to do was go to the ground with him. so that limited his opponents options when defending the take down, putting them at a dissadvantage.
What would happen if Florian went for an ankle like that, would it really be so bad to bring his opponent down to that level and engage him? esbecially when he himself has one of the top sub games at that weight class?
jayhaas08 - Being a defensive wrestler is not good I wrestled for 12 years and was always taught the best defense is a good offense
I think his offensive strategy was to use strikes. He could have tried to go for takedowns against "The Bully" but that probably had an even lower chance of success.
superCalo - He trained defensive wrestling in terms of avoiding/stuffing the take down, but thats only half of it, even the best wrestler will get taken down eventually.Im actually very impressed with Bisping's wrestling. Was able to take down Rashad IIRC
Its getting up from the takedown that he perhaps needed to concentrate more on.
For that he could probably look at how others have been sucessful at that, Bisping for example got taken down multiple times (and stuffed the takedown multiple times ) by Hamill & Rashad, but was quick at getting up ..which can be frustrating if you've gone to all that trouble of taking them down and they get straight up again ...of course takedowns that cause no damage score more points in mMa than a crisp boxing combination that lands effectively and does damage.
Perhaps Florian just dosent have the physical strength to do this, and thats one thing he needs to work on, explosive strength.
kimurayoass -superCalo -kimurayoass -GladiatorGannon -jayhaas08 - Being a defensive wrestler is not good I wrestled for 12 years and was always taught the best defense is a good offense <img src="/images/phone/post_tag.png" alt="Phone Post" border="0" style="vertical-align:middle;"/>
I think his offensive strategy was to use strikes.
well he fucked that up about as bad as one possibly can
apart from actually using strikes he implemented that offensive strategy quite well, stop being so hard on the guy.
whatver you say
im not being hard on him, im being a honest. He is a grappler that wont grapple. instead he chooses to stand but not strike
it is kind of the corner you paint your self in even if you say it about a fighter you respect
"i cant wrestle so i have to strike"
"i cant get too close to strike or he will shoot"
very quickly that becomes "i cant strike and I cant shoot"
so you get the BJ penn and florian fights
the mental lock they were in with themselves was palpable. and i think it starts with this whole "train defensive wrestling" concept because you are alreay aknowleging your dissadvantage and you are deciding in advance what you will not do.
Was he supposed to train offensively in wrestling Gray?
^^^I think that would creat a better outcome.
Where in mma does it work that you can completley avoid some aspect of the game and be successful at this level?
it would be like Maynard or Edger saying "i will only wrestle and not strike" or "I will learn how to block punches but not throw them"
that would be crazy to say even if they knew that their counterparts were better.
Dont get me wrong, Florian and Bj have destroyed wrestlers before but they were also able to use their striking advantages to set up their game.
but what if your opponent is good striker like Gray and Edgar? now youve left yourself no otpions in which to win the fight
jayhaas08 - Being a defensive wrestler is not good I wrestled for 12 years and was always taught the best defense is a good offense <img src="/images/phone/post_tag.png" alt="Phone Post" border="0" style="vertical-align:middle;"/>
Which means nothing of the guy's goal is to stay up on the feet and strike.
he was just trying to make an excuse for losing ,. give the guy a break
really what happened was,,,, he was too hesitant in his striking to land anything solid and he got bullied
Sprawl training???
Look at how some guys who don't have great wrestling scramble out from under guys (for example Bisping). It's not that they are skilled in counter-wrestling. They just hustle. I'm not saying that is everything but damn Kenny had to do something.
imo ken should do the opposite. open up completely with striking, with nmo fear of the eventual takedowns, cuz hes a black belt who can set submission traps from guard. all offensive stuff geared towards damaging or finishing the opponent
TampabayMMA -disbeliever - Kenny has good BJJ. I was surprised we did not see any activity on the bottom from him. It's not like Gray was lighting him up and not giving him any time.
Gray was just sitting on his hips, Kenny was going nowhere on the bottom. He needed to win this fight standing imho.
Maybe he should've just tied Gray up and stalled on the ground so he could get stood up more and use his striking.
TampabayMMA -disbeliever - Kenny has good BJJ. I was surprised we did not see any activity on the bottom from him. It's not like Gray was lighting him up and not giving him any time.
Gray was just sitting on his hips, Kenny was going nowhere on the bottom. He needed to win this fight standing imho.
When the fence wasnt a factor, Kenny got the omoplata attempt and more offensive from the bottom.
The fence plays too big a factor imo. But not sure what the solution is.