Did Shogun figure out the Dragon's Puzzle?

[Minor League Brian]

I'm sure we've talked about this before, but I saw this brought up/posted on Sherdog and thought it was interesting. Before this, many were arguing that Shogun didn't figure anything out but merely withstood the assault and was able to move through it. Something not many would be able to replicate, however this post reminded me of just how poor Machida looked in the fight.

It wasn't Shogun's pain threshold that allowed him to beat Machida.

The main reason why Machida lost their second fight is simple:

Machida did something out of character, and his mistake cost him.

For the discerning fight fan, I will explain:

Machida has a straight left counter, that he is well-known for. He's used it against probably every single one of his opponents that I can think of. You know what it looks like.

Thing is, it's always that - a counter. His opponent has to lead with something. In the above case, Rashad throws a feint jab, and pays for it.

What Machida did in the second Shogun fight, in what can only be called a foolish mistake, was dive in with this counter, before Shogun actually did anything.

In other words, he countered nothing.

This telegraphed his position to Shogun.

Shogun, for his part, made him pay for it.

So, even though Machida threw it away in a sense, I do give Shogun credit because not many fighters could capitalize off of a mistake like that and win.

I give credit to Shogun's power (knocking Lyoto down with an awkward punch); Shogun's positional grappling ability (slipping immediately into the mount during the knockdown, when have you ever seen that before?); and Shogun's GnP (merciless. it could have just been a simple knockdown, but Shogun honed in on Machida's head with solid, immediate, fight-ending blows).

But make no mistake about it, Machida fritzed out and made a mistake. It's not in his usual style to do so, and so solving his 'puzzle' is still very much in the air to me. I'm sure Machida has thought about this. I'd be very curious to see how a third match would play out, I don't picture Machida ever making this mistake again. It's kind of like Fedor diving into Werdum's triangle.

I kinda have to agree with this. Machida didn't look like...well...Machida. He looked lost and just different. I also didn't think Shogun looked so hot but got a good shot on an equally looking poor opponent.

 

[Fizzy]

Thing with Machidas left counter is he leaves his chin straight up making it a fairly easy target. He has always done this. I wouldn't say Shogun figured him out necessarily I merely think Shogun is just a better striker than Machida. Machida to me has a better overall game with his sumo experience making it nearly impossible to take him down, and he seems to be competent in BJJ. There is no doubt Shogun is one of the best if not the best striker at 205, and I think he is just ahead of Machida in that department. Not to mention that punch was to the temple. So yea I just think Shogun is the better striker. If Machida learns to keep his chin down then it might be a more interesting story.

 

[Via Armbar]

Shogun learned something from the first first: Don't let the counter puncher counter you. Sounds pretty self explanatory but there's much more to it.

Look at the fight with Rashad as a perfect example. Rashad throws some powerful punches on occasion, but a lot of the time he has a Frankie Edgar approach to his stand up. He closes the distance, throws a jab or two, throws pitter patter punches and backs away. He uses this to gauge a more powerful shot, but Machida figured out his striking game too early. He already had his counters lined up.

Now look at the first Shogun fight. Rua was very cautious at first but found something that worked for him to set up strikes. He kept using those leg kicks to set up a little flurry of punches, something none of Machida's past opponents have done. Shogun is known for his violent blitzes of offense but he clearly knew that in order to set up those blitzes he needed to get one good clean shot on Lyoto's legs. Clearly, it worked. Machida was still countering but he wasn't given nearly as many openings as he had been used to with his other opponents.

For the second fight, Shogun came in feeling much more comfortable and had a good idea of Machida's countering time. If you look at the GIF that Brian posted above, it would look like Machida did something he doesn't normally do in throwing the first punch. I don't believe that's the case. I really believe that Machida felt like it was going to be a counter, one he had thrown plenty of times and landed. The difference this time was Shogun knew his timing and almost Machida'd Machida so to speak. Shogun's timing for that shot was exactly on the same split second delay timing that Lyoto has always used. So rather than doing what he did the first time which was cautiously sneak in offense after a lead kick and avoid the counter, he decided to use Machida's own countering against him.

So in that sense, yes I do believe he figured out the Machida riddle.

 

[ITurnGirlsGay]

Thing with Machidas left counter is he leaves his chin straight up making it a fairly easy target. He has always done this. I wouldn't say Shogun figured him out necessarily I merely think Shogun is just a better striker than Machida. Machida to me has a better overall game with his sumo experience making it nearly impossible to take him down, and he seems to be competent in BJJ. There is no doubt Shogun is one of the best if not the best striker at 205, and I think he is just ahead of Machida in that department. Not to mention that punch was to the temple. So yea I just think Shogun is the better striker. If Machida learns to keep his chin down then it might be a more interesting story.

I wouldn't go as far as to say that Shogun is a "better striker" in the sense that you're clearly implying. This is apples and oranges. Shogun is an offensive striker. He's not a very good defensive striker. Machida got the better of the defensive exchange with Rua in their first fight. Whether you agree with the decision in their first fight or not, a primary reason that Machida won the decision is because of his ability to press Shogun up against the cage and win the inside exchanges, even when Shogun had Machida pressed up against the cage, he appeared to back off after they worked from the clinch.

Machida is a better defensive striker. It's not within Machida's wheelhouse to launch off on an offensive onslaught like Rua would. Machida works best as an effective counter puncher and someone who takes advantage of openings after fighters become frustrated with his elusive nature. This doesn't mean he's a worse striker than Rua by any stretch of the imagination.

You're comparing two different styles of striking and saying that one is a better striker than another. It's apples and oranges.

Machida is beyond competent in BJJ as well. He's a Black House black belt training under the Nogueira brothers and Silva. If you need evidence of his BJJ prowess you need only watch the end of the Tito Ortiz fight when Tito sank in the triangle and Lyoto did exactly what you needed to do get out while that choke was on there pretty tightly. Many fighters would have panicked and rolled into the choke causing a submission, but Lyoto didn't panic at all and got out of it.

I think it's just a simple case of styles make match-ups. I don't think that Rua will hold the belt very long because of his unimpressive ground game despite being a BJJ black belt. I think that any good wrestler could grind out a victory over Rua. Probably won't be Rashad because of his poor chin, but I think someone like Jon Jones could beat Rua pretty handily. Ryan Bader may even be problematic for Rua. However, I think Machida could beat either of those men and take the belt from them and Rua will win it back from Machida. I think the LHW title is going to continue to play musical hands as it has done for quite some time now.