PATH TO VICTORY
Kyte: Okay, so what are the paths to victory here? Islam’s always just feels like, “Hey — take your pick!” Realistically though, it’s close the distance and turn this into a grappling match.
Madden: Exactly. When you go back and look at his fight with JDM (Jack Della Maddalena), that was his first fight up at welterweight, correct?
Kyte: Yep.
Madden: There were some questions surrounding that fight. JDM, by all accounts, is a phenomenal fighter, well rounded too — both stances, some really unorthodox stuff in there too — but Islam did what Islam does. I think he averaged one takedown per round, because that’s all it took. Each takedown was within the first two minutes of each round, and that was it, aside from JDM getting up maybe once. We know what the plan is and at this point — at this stage of your career, at this point in the sport, why are we looking to make any major changes? This plan — Father’s Plan — works against almost all and any opposition. Left, right, wrestler, grappler, striker… anybody. It doesn’t matter.
Kyte: The level is just that much better than yours. And you were right: he was 4-for-4 on takedowns in that fight; didn’t even attempt one in the second round, but when 4-for-4 and amassed 19 minutes of control time. In a 25-minute fight against a world champion, he goes 4-for-4 and gets four rounds of control time, against a guy that is a really good scrambler.
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Madden: And he just shut that down.
Kyte: Yeah; he had nothing.
Madden: Now when you talk about it specifically for this matchup — because there is a unique path for every opponent in front of you — this is the first time Islam is fighting someone as tall as Ian.
Kyte: Yeah; he’s 6-foot-3, 6-foot-4. Charles (OIiveira) and Dan Hooker are both six-feet tall and have a comparable reach but are different fighters; guys that are happy to come in and engage.
Madden: And Ian largely knows how to use his range effectively; his footwork shows that, his lead hand shows that, his kicks show that. For Islam, getting this fight to the fence is gonna be his strong suit. When a wrestler is fighting a kicker, your job is to follow the kicks in. I love my guy Archie Colgan — last week when he fought Usman (Nurmagomedov), his job was to follow the kicks in, and he was kind of swatting at the kicks and stepping back, and that allowed Usman to set up the question mark kick over the top of that. Any time someone is kicking, their leg has to retract back to their stance, and we follow that space in, close that space off of that, so I’m gonna be looking for Islam to do that. I am going to be interested in — we know in the middle of the cage, Islam likes his single leg entries, but again, distance is gonna be a different than he’s used to, so I’m interested to see if that’s gonna be part of the game plan or if it’s just pressure this guy and use the fence for the takedowns.
I have to imagine it’s gonna be a lot of body lock work against the fence, combined with the single leg to finish the takedown. I will be interested to see how much of his judo he uses against the fence with someone that is so much taller.
Kyte: Absolutely, and has really good balance.
Madden: And has really great balance, which Ian has shown in a lot of his fights. He’s done a pretty good job against a lot of the opponents that have taken him there. The wrestling is going to have to be chained together, but it’s not like Islam has an issue with that. I would expect more of the success in this fight to be against the fence where the distance can be negated. On the ground, I think being tall and rangy in fighting — in MMA in particular — has its pros and cons. Its pros are on the feet, and its cons are on the ground. When you have really long limbs and they’re extended away from your body, it can become a disadvantage against a really tight, compact grappler, so that might work against Ian if — not if, when he finds his shoulders on the canvas.