Coach Conversation | Makhachev vs Volkanovski 2

Kyte: At a time in the sport where everyone is pretty solid everywhere, generally speaking, what is the one thing that each of these competitors do better than anyone else? What is the one element to their game that stands out the most?

Madden: For Islam, when I look at him as a striking coach, I don’t think he has any outstanding qualities. I think he does a really great job of staying within himself — he’s really good at what he does, he keeps it simple — so from that perspective, there isn’t a ton to write home about.

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I don’t even think it’s his wrestling (that is his best trait) — it’s his positional work on the ground. Once he gets you there, like in Round 4 of Islam-Volk I, you’re not going anywhere. I don’t even put him amongst the elite wrestlers right now, but his positional work on the ground is his best trait and we can see that through the finishes he’s racked up in that division, and what he did to Volk in their first fight, in the fourth round.

For Volk, I think being a product of Joe Lopez and the City Kickboxing crew, it’s his stance-switching and his footwork.

I really love — and we saw this in the first fight, and it will be one of his keys to victory — his ability to shift stances moving forward and cover distance, especially as the shorter fighter. His ability to use lateral shifting and change his stance as he moves around the cage is a fantastic trait for him, especially against someone like Islam, who is the bigger fighter, is going to want to come forward a little bit more.

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So the ability for him to feint, use stance switches with his level changes, with his ability to target body and head are his best attributes

Kyte: The Makhachev point is really crucial and really well articulated to me because generally speaking, we all say, “Oh, it’s his wrestling,” but he’s not blast doubles, he’s not barrel into takedowns — it’s along the fence, drag you down, chain things together, and suffocate you when you’re down there.

It’s similar to Khabib (Nurmagomedov) where the real danger is once you’re in the bad spot and they’re comfortable, set up where they want to be, you’re just screwed.

Madden: You’re toast!

Kyte: It’s the physicality and mastery of that craft where they know how to keep you there, even though you’re really good at getting up.

Madden: It’s the weight, the way they position their hips — they shut everything down from those positions, and once he gets there, you’re in a lot of trouble. We’ve seen that time and time again from him.

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Kyte: And when you’re not Volkanovski, it forces you to make poor decisions, and then that’s when you get what happened to Bobby Green, and Dan Hooker, and Drew Dober. Thiago Moises might be the best example — three rounds, did all the right things, BJJ black belt, not gonna let him get anything, gonna defend well, and then the fourth round comes, he’s on your back and you make a mistake, and it’s over.

And then with Volk, I think people don’t realize he has a pretty solid reach despite being a shorter guy. There is a negligible difference between these two, but because he’s short, everyone just says, “He’s going to have to work to get inside” when that isn’t always the case.

But he’s really good at it, and that shift you talked about is really impressive. (Israel Adesanya) does it, Volk does it…

Madden: I think Brad Riddell is a big piece of that thread, and Petr Yan is the same, and these are all guys that spent a lot of time at Tiger Muay Thai when Brad was teaching there. You see that forward shifting, blitzing style where they can throw from both stances, they’re effective from both sides — you see it really well in Brad’s fights, and I know he teaches it really well.

He has such a great mind for this sport.

Path to Victory for Each Fighter

Kyte: Everyone would love a 10-second knockout or a quick submission, but that’s not often how these things go, especially not at the championship level. Instead, it’s usually the competitor that has crafted the better game plan and did the better job of executing things inside the Octagon that comes away with their hand raised and the gold around their waist.

So, how does either man get it done on Saturday night?

Madden: For Volk, I think he’s going to be decent shape. I don’t think he’s the type of guy that is ever going to let himself get too far away from where he needs to be. I think since February, they’ve been thinking about this fight — they didn’t know when it was going to happen, but I’m sure that right away, they got to work on the mistakes that he made in that first fight and started working to make the necessary adjustments.

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I think what we just talked about — Volk shifting forward, catching Islam, and to use a phrase Trevor Wittman uses all the time, “breaking the base,” which is getting Islam, who is the bigger fighter to give up some ground, compromise his stance. Volk did it well a couple times in the first fight where he backed Islam up and made him pay for that.

I’d like to see him commit to that blitz, break Islam’s base with it. I’d like to see him add in more low kicks because that’s another way, I think, to break the base, and we know if we can do some damage to that front leg early on, that’s going to impact Islam’s ability to wrestle later on; his ability to be explosive, and level change, his ability to be explosive when he throws his left hand or left kick.

Madden: Exactly, and we saw a few times in that first fight where Islam decided to hold his ground when Volk came forward and he countered off that first step and he made Volk pay for it a couple times. He wobbled Volk with the left hand, (landed) the check hook a couple times, and so when he held his ground on Volk’s entries, he had a lot of success with that.

It’s tough, though, because your natural reaction is to give ground and give space when someone is coming at you swinging hammers, even for someone at this level. It took him a little time to make that adjustment, but when he did, he found success with it.

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So being the bigger fighter, in his natural weight class, I think he has to make the cage feel a little smaller for Volk. He has to use his size, his presence in the cage, and hold that ground because we know when he puts Volk to the fence, that’s when he’s going to do his best work.

I also think we saw Volk do such a great job of creating scrambles in the first fight — and this is what we talked about earlier where Islam is not one of the top, elite wrestlers. I do think he gave Volk too many opportunities to scramble in that first fight, so I’m going to be interested to see how he can shut those scrambles down, if he’s going to chain his wrestling together a little more in order to keep Volk from scrambling out and changing positions.

Kyte: It’s so funny to me how infrequently we talk about those natural tendencies like ceding ground when someone is coming forward because we’re so used to seeing these men and women get in there, get into fist fights, and be willing to wade into the fire to where we forget that the natural inclination is to go backwards and find space.

Madden: Even at the highest level, the No. 1 defense in MMA is to give ground, right off the bat. “I’m gonna give you a little space here.”

Kyte: Right. We’re not talking about running away, but just “I’m gonna take two steps back because you took one forward.” Unfortunately, if you take two steps back every time they take one forward, you’re up against the fence and then you’re in trouble.

X Factor

Kyte: If there were one thing that was going to significantly impact how this fight plays out — that swings it in one direction or the other — what would it be?

Madden: It’s gotta be the short notice, right? And that can play both ways.

People do talk about it, but short notice for Islam is also difficult. We’re talking about going from Charles Oliveira to Alex Volkanovski — structurally that’s a massive difference for the game plan. The entries that Islam was working on against Charles are probably not going to work against Alex.

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We saw Islam shoot two open-mat takedowns against Volk and he was successful with them, but mostly that was Volk’s fault — he came in a little too tall, Islam level-changed, and was able to take him down. Generally, I think those would be more available and successful against Charles and he’s not going to have as much success with those against Volk.

The game plan has to change for Islam too on 11 days. Now, he’s done a full camp, and he’s going to be confident in his preparation either way, in his ability to make the adjustments.

Kyte: Coaches see the sport differently and look at the sport differently than anyone else, picking up on different things and paying attention to movements, habits, or intangible pieces that others might not notice, but that could have a significant impact on the action inside the Octagon.

Every matchup offers its own unique collection of elements that might pique a coach’s interest and get them paying a little closer attention to once the fight gets underway.

So what is that one thing in this matchup?

Madden: For Volk, it’s going to be the blitzing attacks, which were a double-edged sword.

He found some great success with them, especially in the first round, but there were times when he shifted forward and was in the pocket for too long, and Islam made him pay for that as well. So I would like to see if he can make some adjustments with those attacks. Maybe he’s finishing with a leg kick? Maybe he’s exiting at angles off of those instead of coming straight in and straight back?

There are some small adjustments to his blitz arsenal that I want to see if he can adjust, just slightly. More than anything, it’s not being in the pocket too long and focusing on the exits. If he can tighten those up for this fight, I think we’ll see him have more success than he did in the first fight with those.

For Islam, I think he allowed Volk to scramble too much in that first fight, so I’m going to be paying attention to his wrestling sequences to see if he can get to some stronger positions early on so that like we talked about — can he get to his strong positions and chain wrestle a little more?

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Kyte: I’m really curious to know — and I don’t think he’d admit fully one way or the other — whether he underestimated Volk a little in the first fight? Did you just have a little bit of the “this little guy can’t handle me” and then he showed up and you’re like, “Okay; he’s quite good.”

I wonder if there was a little hubris there, a little thinking that he’s going to have an easier time of things, and then Volk is just better everywhere than you thought. So now you’ve had that experience in there with him and you know “I need to make this adjustment and that adjustment because he does this, did that, etc,” precisely like you’re saying.

I just wonder if there was just a little “he can’t be this good. He can’t be on my level.”

Madden: I was thinking about that earlier too because Volk was really buoyed by that Australian crowd, and maybe it even made him fight a little reckless at times. Now it’s an away game for Volk, you’e in Islam’s backyard, so how is that going to change the dynamic of the fight?

Is Volk going to fight a little more disciplined? Is Islam going to be a little more reckless now? That plays a factor 100 percent.

Kyte: There is so much that goes into it. It’s all so fascinating.

Madden: This sport keeps me up at night; it’s wild.