Once Conor devotes himself to something, it’s scary the level of focus he can bring to it… no matter what it is. It’s not something I’ve seen many other people with the ability to do. Conor is a brown belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu now, and he’s given hell to every black belt he’s trained with.
I have a long list of guys I could bring in to mimic Jose Aldo’s style if I needed to, but it’s just not that hard to mimic. Aldo doesn’t really drop people with his hands — he scores, more than hurts — so for Conor to be going in against someone with fast hands who’ll throw the occasional kick… that’s exactly the kind of guy he’s been training with since he was 10-years-old.
Conor is from a boxing background, and nobody has lighter, faster hands than an amateur boxer. So he’s been facing Jose Aldo throughout his life. But there’s little doubt in my mind that Aldo will look for the takedown pretty early. He’s got a pretty decent takedown too. However, he seldom uses it in competition, so I don’t think it will be natural for him to do so. If Aldo does chase takedowns, I think he’ll get tired pretty quickly.
I expect the fight to go one of two ways: they’ll exchange shots and Aldo will go down in one round, or else Aldo will grapple his way into the second round — maybe even the third — but that will tire him because he’s not used to doing that. Then Conor will put him away.
Aldo is going in against someone who is the complete opposite of what he’s been preparing for over the last few years. He’s trained himself to beat American wrestlers, but now he’s facing a rangy European with knockout power. It’s a big change for Jose, but it’s quite a standard opponent for Conor.
I think Aldo will be emotional and will want to come out and exchange with Conor on the feet. But with his experience, he won’t be stupid enough to keep that up for too long. If the fight goes to the ground, will people be surprised by how Conor handles it?
I’ll put it like this: it wouldn’t shock me at all if Conor were to submit Aldo, especially as Aldo starts to tire. Conor has a fantastic guillotine off his back and a really good triangle and armbar too, so there’ll be plenty of opportunities to submit Aldo when fatigue sets in and he starts to leave himself exposed.
?Don?t be surprised to see Conor beat Aldo by submission? ? John Kavanagh writes exclusively for The42