Fightnomics: The Hidden Numbers in Mixed Martial Arts and Why There’s No Such Thing as a Fair Fight

336 Pages·2013·5.42 MB·English

by  Reed Kuhn

IGHT
The Hidden Numbers and Science in Mixed Martial Arts
OMRES
...and Why There's No Such Thing as a Fair Fight

REED KUHN
How UFC Fights End (Take 1)
The Effect of Fatigue
Slam Science: With a Bang Not a Whimper
The Reach Advantage: The Reality of Range
It’s the Brain, Stupid
v%
World Cup of MMA: Breaking Down Fighters by Geography
The Balance of Power
Deciphering the Fightnomics “Uber Tale of the Tape”
Always Read the Credits
REED KUHN
with KELLY CRIGGER
Fightnomics
The Hidden Numbers and Science in Mixed Martial Arts
... and why there’s no such thing as a fair fight
By Reed Kuhn
With New Y ork Times Bestselling Author
Kelly Crigger
Fightnomics ® is a registered trademark of Calvert Strategies LLC.
Copyright © 2013 by Graybeard Publishing LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission
from the publisher.
ISBN: 978-0-9912382-0-0
Graybeard ® is a registered trademark of Graybeard Publishing LLC Printed in the United States of
America
Disclaimers:
Ultimate Fighting Championships (UFC), the Octagon, World Extreme Cagefighting (WEC), Strikeforce,
Zuffa, PRIDE, and DREa are all registered trademarks, and are referenced here as part of the public
domain.
fight • nom • ics
fight: an attempt to overcome opposition, especially physically, through
confrontation -nomics: suffix meaning “law;” the laws defining the underlying
properties of a given subject
This book is dedicated to the men and women “of the Arena.”
Where to Find Stuff
Foreword
Prologue
Wednesday, April 1, 2009 Sifting Signal from Noise
1. Introduction: The Evolution of Combat Sports
The Natural Evolution of Fighting From Common Ancestor to the Melting Pot
How the Gladiator Got on TV
2. Numbers in the Cage: What Stats Can Tell Us About Sports & MMA
Introduction to Quantitative Sports Mythbusting MMA Stats 101: Winners,
Losers, and Neithers How UFC Fights End (Take 1)
How UFC Fights End (Take 2)
The FightMetric System Don’t Forget the TIP
3. Advanced MMA Stats: The Standup Game
Position-Target-Strength-Success
Strikes That Finish Fights
The Reality of Knockout Power: Size Matters
The Effect of Fatigue
4. Beyond Standup: More MMA Striking Stats
Clinch Striking Ground Striking
When and Where UFC Fighters Strike How the Strike Became “Significant”
The Evolution of MMA Striking The Pace Advantage
5. Advanced MMA Stats: The Ground Game
How Takedowns Work in the UFC Slam Science: With a Bang Not a Whimper
How Submissions Work in the UFC The Slickest Subs of All The Grappler’s
Ticking Clock
6. Hacking the Tale of the Tape: How Size Matters, and How It Doesn’t
Weight Class Matters
The UFC Arms Race & the Incredible Shrinking Middleweight The Reach
Advantage: The Reality of Range How Reach Works
The Truth About the “Height Advantage”
7. Beyond the Measuring Tape: Rookies, Veterans, and Southpaws
The Trouble with Lefties A Brief History of Lefties Quantifying the Southpaw
Advantage
The Youth Advantage
The Price of Wisdom: Age and Knockouts in MMA
8. Assume the Position: Fighter Position & What it Tells Us
The Decline of the Clinch
The Ground Game
Are Wrestlers Ruining MMA?
9. MMA Betting Lines: The Odds Are Good, but the Goods Are Odd
Running the Numbers on the Odds Makers The Power of Hype, and Why It’s
Profitable Not So Quick on the Draw
A Few Simple Betting Strategies That Will Get You Paid
10. Fistful of Dollars: Fight Night Bonuses
A Brief History of UFC Fight Night Bonuses Who Wins Fight Night Bonuses?
But Who Really Wins Fight Night Bonuses?
11. World Cup of MMA: Breaking Down Fighters by Geography Where Do
UFC Fighters Come From?
Best Overall Finishers
Best Standup Strikers
Best Wrestlers
Best Submission Artists
Where Do American Fighters Come From?
12. For the Record: Settling the Biggest Debates in MMA (for now)
The Truth About Finish Rates
The Home-Cage Advantage
The Balance of Power
Missing More Than Just Weight
What About the Extra Pound at WeighIns?
Octagon Jitters Is Ring Rust Real?
The Value of Streaks
Agree to Disagree: MMA Judging
The Money Chart: Advantages & Disadvantages in MMA
13. The Fringe: Strange Forces That Matter in Fights, and Some That Don’t
Small Fish in a Bigger Pond: The Dirty Secret of the WEC Merger Below the
Belt: Do Low Blows Affect Fight Outcomes?
The Loser’s Smile
The Astrology of MMA: Pitting Zodiac Signs in a Cage Fight Snake Oil in the
Cage
14. Deciphering the Fightnomics “Uber Tale of the Tape”
There’s No Such thing as a Fair Fight
15. The Future of MMA: The Last & Greatest Combat Sport MMA Killed the
Kung Fu Star
The Science of the Circus: Why UFC Shows Are So Thrilling The Future of
MMA
Next Generation MMA Analytics Optimizing the Ultimate The Final Word
16. Always Read the Credits
Foreword
There really is no such thing as a fair fight. The first time this realization
punched me in the gu1 was when Pete Williams knocked out Mark “The
Hammer” Coleman at UFC 17. Williams was a 22 year old unknown in his UFC
debut while Coleman was an Olympic silver medalist wrestler ant former UFC
heavyweight champion who had ground and pounded through more impressive
opponents, with his only loss being a decision in a championship fight. He was
virtually unstoppable, and in my mind Williams was taking a quick trip to the
hospital with a healthy dose of trauma counseling afterward. It was like
watching Friday the 13th when idiot teenagers get drunk in Jason’s house. You
watch, but only to see them get what’s coming for making such a horrible
decision.
Within seconds Coleman had taken Williams to the mat and was implementing
his very violent will and I was heading to the fridge for another beer. I thought
this fight was already in the record books, but after twelve minutes there was no
winner and we were going into a three-minute overtime. Suddenly Williams
knocked Coleman out with a brutal head kick that he’d set up with several low
strikes. He rejoiced while the MMA world’s smartest guys slumped along with
Coleman’s body. Using the basic fundamentals of mixed martial arts Williams
negated Coleman’s strength and exploited his weaknesses. I was dumbfounded,
awestruck, and kerfuffled.
Williams displayed the three main tenets of battle that every soldier learns -
know yourself, know your enemy, and know the ground on which you fight.
Utilizing these principles is what separates good fighters from the ones who get
Gatorade commercials, but what about the rest of the chaotic chaos? A variety of
external and internal factors can affect a fight - heart, chance, jitters, ring rust,
and newborn babies - so the big question is “how do we account for all those
things?”
With data.
Watching fight tapes to know your enemy and the ground you fight on is great,
but it’s limited and only provides a fighter with a piece of the pugilistic puzzle.
He still has to know himself and what he can and cannot do. Hard data is far
more definitive and allows a fight camp to develop a sound strategy long before
fight day.
Gathering and analyzing that information sounds like a simple concept, but in
fact it’s laborious and monotonous to mine numbers from fight videos. It’s even
harder to then find patterns and develop actionable intelligence that arms a
fighter with all the knowledge he needs to win. It also takes a 200-pound brain
wired for science. I never would have believed someone could develop analysis
that could be used to more accurately predict future performance in MMA based
just on numbers. This is the first time anyone has had the hard drive and moxie
to attempt it.
I’ve always been skeptical of numbers because they can be skewed to reach
whatever conclusion the writer desires. Numbers are the whores of bias that will
lead you to whatever conclusion they want with just a little manipulation from
the John. That’s why I like Reed’s approach. He doesn’t let the data become
cheap or easy. He treats it with respect like a beloved daughter and presents it in
a fair, unbiased way until it’s a bride at a white wedding and he’s the proud papa
giving it away. No one else has had the gumption to attempt anything like what
Reed has accomplished, so he’s a true trailblazer in MMA statistics and it was a
no-brainer to get involved with this project. If he’s Meriwether Lewis on a
journey of discovery, then I’ll happily be his William Clark.
While writing this book I learned exactly why Williams shocked everyone and
defeated Coleman at UFC 17. While Coleman’s takedown attempts and accuracy
were high and his time in a dominan position was even higher, his cardio