The Case for Watching Tape on Opposition in Professional MMA

by Luke Thomas at BloodyElbow.com

It's not that the counter itself was special. It is that Marquardt focused on a specific technical flaw in his opponent, and the instant it appeared, he sent him flying at the canvas forehead-first. Yet for as obvious and effective as this kind of hyper-specific stratagem seems, it is a rarity in this game. Even with major money now at stake, MMA is still a sport where lines like "It's a fight" and "We'll see where it goes" are familiar phraseology.

Just a few months back, Josh Koscheck commented that he never watches his opponents before he fights them and almost seemed to brag that he had no idea what Paulo Thiago looked like. I imagine he might have liked to have at least a gander at some fight tape now. Likewise, talented middleweight Dan Miller admits to not watching his opponents beforehand, but after being completely dominated by a one-dimensional Chael Sonnen for 15 minutes, hopefully he realizes that a bit of time watching tape may have helped him find an opening for a submission against a fighter far less skilled in that department than himself.

Part of the reason these attitudes persist is that MMA is still reliant on crippling generalities. We still discuss the sport in terms of "strikers" and "grapplers" and throw out adjectives like "unorthodox" and "world-class" without much thought to individual skills and technique. However, it isn't 1999 anymore, and fighters have become generally, if not perfectly, well rounded. In 2009, these oversimplifications are lies, as fights are more often won and lost on the very specific and unique wrinkles — both positive and negative — in a fighter's game.

The amount of phony generalization one hears from high-level, accomplished (if fatally flawed) fighters is astounding and the repudiation of studying opposition often seems positively correlated when those attitudes are present.

The reality is that watching tape to prepare for a fight against a highly skilled, modern professional MMA fighter is no guarantee of success. It's also true that fighters who eschew watching tape often find their "fight my fight, not his fight" attitude is enough to gut through whatever challenges are presented from a lack of preparation. And I understand fighters who personally elect to not watch footage on their opponents for psychological reasons, yet still leave that responsibility to trainers.

However, one has to dig deep in the bag of denial to suggest becoming familiar with the habits, eccentricities, instincts, mistakes and decision-making tendencies of opposition prior to a fight isn't, on balance, helpful. Look no further than any other professional, mainstream sport. There isn't an accomplished team in football, basketball, baseball or hockey that dismisses the idea of watching tape of upcoming teams they have to play as unhelpful. Who views the tape or how much tape is viewed or even for what purposes likely changes from coach to coach and team to team, but the lesson is the same: knowing thy enemy helps a competitor make more informed choices.

Informed choices aren't always correct choices, but they are surely a better insurance policy than anything ad hoc.