[eastcoastMMAfan]

Originally Posted by galathrax

Okay, this is getting a bit ridiculous.

These statistics are WRONG. This is a stupid analysis, no offense to OP. It sounds legit, but if you actually think about it for a minute...

The ONLY way elbows ending a fight is relevant (or even possible) is if elbows are in fact utilized in the fight. Quoting this massive # of fights, and then some tiny little percentage is misleading as hell. ONLY FIGHTS WHERE FIGHTERS ACTUALLY USE ELBOWS SHOULD BE CONSIDERED.

That being said, I still think the % is low enough that it's almost irrelevant. But you should at least be honest about it.

The flipside of this argument is with stomps/soccer kicks... you'll find the same exact thing: where fighters actually utilize these moves, the % of fights actually stopped from them is rather low (but omg, they look so brutal!!! wah wah, go watch figure skating then).

And the difference between stomps/soccer kicks and groin shots, eye gouging, and headbutts is that those moves injure fighters virtually every time they're used, and don't require ANY skill. Everybody complaining that stomps/soccer kicks turn it into a street fight have obviously never actually used stomps/soccer kicks on a live, resisting, TRAINED opponent.

I think that there is a very large percentage of fights that do have elbows used. I would go so far as to say I think a majority of fights in the UFC have elbows used at least once.