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Damien Maia... The most frustrating fighter in the UFC?

2K views 17 replies 17 participants last post by  demoman993 
#1 ·
When I watch Maia fight I always find myself feeling disappointed and somewhat frustrated with his performances in the Octagon.

This is a guy who has won god knows how many BJJ competitions and is for the most part considered one of, if not THE best bjj practitioner currently fighting in the UFC, yet he insists on ignoring the fact and continuously play the striking games, where lets face it, dispite his continued improvement, still sucks.

In last nights fight he ended up on the mat a few times and I was thinking 'ok, here we go' but he used his BJJ... TO STAND UP!!! I couldn't believe it. He was fighting a guy, who cut over 30lbs in 11 days and was viseably tired by the middle of round 2. If Maia had kept the fight on the floor, worked his positions and managed to put Weidman in some difficult positions I'm almost positive he could have got the W.

Maia looked terrible and worst of all he gassed. Imagine he had been fighting Bisping, a man who rarely, if ever gets tired in the cage. What an embarrassment that could have turned out to be.
 
#2 ·
When I watch Maia fight I always find myself feeling disappointed and somewhat frustrated with his performances in the Octagon.

This is a guy who has won god knows how many BJJ competitions and is for the most part considered one of, if not THE best bjj practitioner currently fighting in the UFC, yet he insists on ignoring the fact and continuously play the striking games, where lets face it, dispute his continued improvement, still sucks.

In last nights fight he ended up on the mat a few times and I was thinking 'ok, here we go' but he used his BJJ... TO STAND UP!!! I couldn't believe it. He was fighting a guy, who cut over 30lbs in 11 days and was viseably tired by the middle of round 2. If Maia had kept the fight on the floor, worked his positions and managed to put Weidman in some difficult positions I'm almost positive hold have got the W.

Maia looked terrible and worst of all he gassed. Imagine he had been fighting Bisping, a man who rarely, if ever gets tired in the cage. What an embarrassment that could have turned out to be.
I agree completely, he never posed a real threat to Weidman standing. I wonder if he trains so exclusively to stand up now he's lost faith in his ground game.
 
#3 ·
Apparently he had the flu coming in, he did an interview with Karyn and mentioned that Chicago was very cold so that probably had something to do with his performance. He certainly should have fared a lot better than he did last night. I'm a big fan of Weidman but if Maia wasn't sick there was no excuse for how bad his stand up looked last night against a guy whose 7-0 with rudimentary striking at best.

I don't think he's ever been the same since the Marquardt fight in all honesty, he got creamed in quick fashion and then he went on and had very, very little to offer Anderson and a title shot might as well be a fantasy for him with Anderson at the top of the division.
 
#4 ·
He should start pulling guard. I don't think he's a threat to very many people with his striking game, but he's a threat to everyone on the ground.
 
#5 ·
Yeah frustrating to watch for sure. I hate generally speaking when a fighter has a strength and they dont even try to use it. I remember watching Hughes vs Renzo and Renzo didnt even try to take it to the ground at all. Same thing with Gonzaga.

I find that this type of things happens alot.

It would be like watching the Baltimore Ravens in the playoffs, say "**** Defense were not gonna even try, lets win by Flacco's offense".

People bash on GSP for how he fights, least he takes the fights to other fighter's weaknesses.
 
#6 ·
I'll give a resounding HELL YES!, since I laid down £50 of your finest buttons, on this little scamp.

His striking actually looked like it had regressed. It has definitely looked better in the past against marginally better strikers. Also, good points made about the WTFness of him using his BJJ to stand up and go back to throwing punches that my grandmother could have moved out of the way of.

Disappointing. I had such high hopes for Maia ( or rather, my wallet gaining some papery thickness to it )
 
#7 ·
Very poor fight overall. Neither fighter really belongs standing up with such sloppy striking. No killer instinct, no snap in their punches. I could't count how many times they hesitated halfway through punches. It actually seemed like they were scared to hurt each other.

Maia needs to quit thinking he can stand and bang, maybe if he works on his GnP it might be effective given his BJJ would get him into some good positions to finish.
 
#8 ·
Its his wrestling that he really needs to work on so that he can take down wrestlers and use his BJJ. He also seriosly needs to work on his power/explosiveness/conditioning. Some of his shots were from waaaay out, there was no set up, his head was down and he was literally diving at the floor. You won't take down someone who has been wrestling a month with shots like that, let alone elite wrestlers. I loved watching Maia when he utilised his BJJ, but now he bores me. I get the fact he doesn't want to be on his back with the way judges score fights, in fact he was getting back to his feet really really well, so fair enough if he doesn't want to play bottom game, even though he has had tremendous success there previosly.

To conclude this ramble, he needs to keep working on his striking but more than anything else work on his offensive wrestling and his power. He would be so so dangerous if he had a good power double.
 
#10 ·
I was just thinking this myself. It's like he's suddenly became some kind of one dimensional fighter and lets face it, it isn't exactly getting him in the win column. Like you i couldn't beleive it when he used his BJJ skills to stand up! There is only so much longer that the UFC can call him the best BJJ guy in the UFC, as he isn't showing it.

I have no doubt that Bisping would have finished Maia if that fight was still on the card.
 
#11 ·
And he isn't even looking good in the loss. At least when say, Koschek for example, stopped trying to take people down and started to try and out strike, even in the fights he lost, they were exciting brawls at worst...

The way Maia is losing is just boring to watchbecause his stand up is terrible and he almost seems afraid to be hit.
 
#12 ·
It's very frustrating to watch. He's using his best weapon defensively and I don't think anyone is scared of Maia striking. Sometimes I wish he would just pull guard. Whenever the fight hit the ground Maia hit some kind of sweep or whatever and got back up almost instantly... I refuse to believe he would have had a tough time with Weidman on the ground.
 
#14 ·
That fight was really weird. Maia looked gassed in the first round (Weidman didn't look much better though). His punches were sloppy and as someone mentioned looked worse than in some of his previous fights.

Wasn't there an interview lately where Maia said that he would return to his roots what initially brought him his success in the UFC and would focus again on his BJJ¿

There are quite some BJJ fighters that, to my taste, fell too much in love with their boxing (i.e. the Nogueiras). Maia probably is in a fringe zone between boxing and BJJ. By focussing too much on his boxing, those new boxing reflexes interfere with his BJJ so that he lost some of his skills there, but he didn't box long enough that his boxing can compete with longtime strikers. Maybe he learns to use his boxing to set up his BJJ instead of trying to pretend to be a striker.

Using his BJJ to stand up was really a WTF-moment. He had his opponent almost reversed and could have attacked on the ground, but no he stands up and returns to sloppy punches.:confused03:
 
#17 ·
For the life of me I cannot figure out why he's chosen to be a mediocre striker, rather than a briliant submission-artist...

He used to have that Palhares-vibe about him, you knew what he was gonna do in the cage, but he got away with it anyway...

Nowadays, not so much :/
 
#18 ·
Ya I really used to like Maia when he was a 1 dimensional submission killer. At least there was a good chance that he would pull off something amazing.

His standup is awful at best and he shows absolutely no desire to take the fight down. I have little to no interest in watching him fight now.
 
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