The days of throwing up triangles and armbars from your back are long gone. Interesting that the guillotine has held strong. Seems like it fails much more often than not.
Kind of interesting. Maybe because it is and likely always will be a viable way to defend a takedown and get offensive off your back. Doesn't seem like there are pathways that the game will evolve past that tactic so if you're good at it and practice it, it will always be a tool that should be used. Even if you're a striker, working on the gilly makes you a threat to take down.
I'm still optimistic k guard is the answer.
If you're near the fence, and don't got the space then get up if possible.
Any example of k guard failing, I'm thinking the guys who used it aren't good enough.
Kinda like rubber guard failed when we saw Tony use it.
But Tony is probably not as good as Mason Fowler and Ben Eddy at it.
I think it's because guys actually don't really gnp from guard that much anymore.
They stay really close and hold. Now they try to get top half then smash.
Granted technically you can still get triangles if they're close. I just think no one really trains it.
Yeah. Most top enough level fighters are much better at scrambling, so they are less likely to just resort into guard. While on top, most fighters probably figure gnp from guard is too taxing on themselves to warrant the offensive reward, unless you have that explosivity and strength to generate that much power and do relevant enough damage. And it's better to instead work to advance positioning with mma grappling with your average fighter in general having vastly improved.
Yeah the most interesting part of the table is that triangles got more popular before falling off.
BJJ came in, dominated, and then the wrestlers learned how to stop it.
My personal big takeaways are the kimura lands way less frequently than I thought, and the arm triangle has been utilized a lot more this past decade than before. I remember watching Brock land the arm triangle on Carwin and thinking "you don't see that submission every day!" But since then you DO see it pretty much every day lol.
I never understood why people didn't use the arm triangle more. It's one of the few submissions that you can attempt without sacrificing your positioning on top. Clearly fighters and coaches have figured that out and use it way more.
Arm Triangle is OP but people aren't using it from half guard to pass / punch. When you do you turn into a monster. It's a key piece of [Islam's game](https://www.opennotegrappling.com/p/islam-makhachev-top-half-guard).
in case OP sees this: the “Other” class is small enough that you could probably go find the clips and categorize them by hand
some interesting insights here. would also like to see the totals as well as proportion of fights ending in sub by decade
might get a more granular view of how things have evolved over time by plotting rolling proportions for each sub type
I'm not the person that made the table. I asked homie if he could make something interactive for me but he has other priorities. I am curious to drill down into some of the numbers though. For instance, there have been 9 ankle locks in the UFC...who are they?
I thought lower body submissions would've been more common later on, not early on. I get that nobody knew to defend them early on, but they've also been offensively drilled so much later on.
The game is evolving so quickly and like all sports, the talent is increasing over time. Joint locks are so risky because defending then and escaping them is much easier than locking them in. It will take minutes of work to get a deep lower body lock in and it will most of the time be a waste of energy. Better to fight for a higher probability finish against opponents of such caliber, I'd think.
It's probably gonna rise up a bit in the next years, the leg lock meta in bjj isn't that old and most likely will make its way to MMA once a few fighters adapt the flow to the sport
Eh, you've had a lot of high level guys from there already that came over to MMA and couldn't really use leg attacks the same way except on really low level guys. It's just not as suited to MMA, because the other guy now has an open head to punch, especially if he's less willing to tap than guys in a BJJ comp are.
They're just way higher risk in an MMA fight than other submissions.
Lower body attacks become much less effective when the other guy is able to punch you in the face and is also a lot more willing to tank the damage and not tap, because the fight means a lot more than a BJJ comp does.
The days of throwing up triangles and armbars from your back are long gone. Interesting that the guillotine has held strong. Seems like it fails much more often than not.
Kind of interesting. Maybe because it is and likely always will be a viable way to defend a takedown and get offensive off your back. Doesn't seem like there are pathways that the game will evolve past that tactic so if you're good at it and practice it, it will always be a tool that should be used. Even if you're a striker, working on the gilly makes you a threat to take down.
There will always be a place for a submission most useful for finishing a gassed opponent with a chin shooting a takedown
I'm still optimistic k guard is the answer. If you're near the fence, and don't got the space then get up if possible. Any example of k guard failing, I'm thinking the guys who used it aren't good enough. Kinda like rubber guard failed when we saw Tony use it. But Tony is probably not as good as Mason Fowler and Ben Eddy at it.
I think it's because guys actually don't really gnp from guard that much anymore. They stay really close and hold. Now they try to get top half then smash. Granted technically you can still get triangles if they're close. I just think no one really trains it.
Yeah. Most top enough level fighters are much better at scrambling, so they are less likely to just resort into guard. While on top, most fighters probably figure gnp from guard is too taxing on themselves to warrant the offensive reward, unless you have that explosivity and strength to generate that much power and do relevant enough damage. And it's better to instead work to advance positioning with mma grappling with your average fighter in general having vastly improved.
Yeah the most interesting part of the table is that triangles got more popular before falling off. BJJ came in, dominated, and then the wrestlers learned how to stop it.
When in doubt, jump the gilly
Could go deeper into stats and do success rate over all attempts.
Sad to see the decline of other
I wonder how many of the heel hooks & kneebars of the '10s were Palhares.
He had 5 heel hook submissions total in the UFC (no kneebars), but one was in 2009
people hate him but watching him get those were a beauty. i hope a leglock specialist succeeds him in ufc thats better than ryan hall lol
I hope whoever succeeds him learns to fucking let go when their opponent taps lol
My personal big takeaways are the kimura lands way less frequently than I thought, and the arm triangle has been utilized a lot more this past decade than before. I remember watching Brock land the arm triangle on Carwin and thinking "you don't see that submission every day!" But since then you DO see it pretty much every day lol.
I never understood why people didn't use the arm triangle more. It's one of the few submissions that you can attempt without sacrificing your positioning on top. Clearly fighters and coaches have figured that out and use it way more.
Arm Triangle is OP but people aren't using it from half guard to pass / punch. When you do you turn into a monster. It's a key piece of [Islam's game](https://www.opennotegrappling.com/p/islam-makhachev-top-half-guard).
Dustin looking all those gillys being jumped and salivating
in case OP sees this: the “Other” class is small enough that you could probably go find the clips and categorize them by hand some interesting insights here. would also like to see the totals as well as proportion of fights ending in sub by decade might get a more granular view of how things have evolved over time by plotting rolling proportions for each sub type
I'm not the person that made the table. I asked homie if he could make something interactive for me but he has other priorities. I am curious to drill down into some of the numbers though. For instance, there have been 9 ankle locks in the UFC...who are they?
Is any of it from fighters training less and less on moves with high joint injury risk when rolling with partners?
What were the "other" submissions in the 90s that apparently don't work anymore?
I thought lower body submissions would've been more common later on, not early on. I get that nobody knew to defend them early on, but they've also been offensively drilled so much later on.
The game is evolving so quickly and like all sports, the talent is increasing over time. Joint locks are so risky because defending then and escaping them is much easier than locking them in. It will take minutes of work to get a deep lower body lock in and it will most of the time be a waste of energy. Better to fight for a higher probability finish against opponents of such caliber, I'd think.
I’m not surprised, it’s tough to find an opportunity at such high levels
They often result in the attacker being in a terrible position. Even Gary Tonon got knocked out trying to get a leg lock.
It's probably gonna rise up a bit in the next years, the leg lock meta in bjj isn't that old and most likely will make its way to MMA once a few fighters adapt the flow to the sport
Eh, you've had a lot of high level guys from there already that came over to MMA and couldn't really use leg attacks the same way except on really low level guys. It's just not as suited to MMA, because the other guy now has an open head to punch, especially if he's less willing to tap than guys in a BJJ comp are. They're just way higher risk in an MMA fight than other submissions.
Lower body attacks become much less effective when the other guy is able to punch you in the face and is also a lot more willing to tank the damage and not tap, because the fight means a lot more than a BJJ comp does.
Where's the Goose Grip stats?
Why were there so many “other” in the 90s?
where is americana
Honestly can't remember the last triangle I saw.
Can we get the data for attempted vs. completed?
Armbars really fell off :'(