BJ Penn's takedown defense

gatorman1122 · 05-25-2008, 10:33 AM

Anyone know what BJ does that's so effective in defending the takedown against world-class wrestlers?

He seems to let his lead leg hang out there while throwing jabs, baiting you to go for a single leg and then just shrugging you off.

Sherk only attempted 1 takedown against BJ, and even Matt Hughes struggled to take BJ down.

Tony Manifold · 05-25-2008, 10:40 AM

Fight metric did an analysis that said if you took out the 2nd hughes fight and his fight with serra, he gets takedown 58% of the time. If you only take out the serra fight (Serra's takedowns aren't very good) he gets taken down at 48% which is about average.

What he did against hughes and sherk more than anything is use his hands to force them to shoot from outside, and when they try the low single he just lets them have it and sprawls back to the spilts. With BJ a single is stupid. He is too flexible with to good of balance. GSP took him down with doubles and body locks, Hughes took him down with a double as well.

georgejjr · 05-25-2008, 11:30 AM

Not sure he actually fought a world class wrestler (it means olympic level, and I don't think he's fought a guy who made it to the olympics).

But mainly, as was pointed out above, because of his striking fighters generally have to do their shot from well outside touching range, giving him lots of time to react.

Mikey Triangles · 05-25-2008, 11:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgejjr

Not sure he actually fought a world class wrestler (it means olympic level, and I don't think he's fought a guy who made it to the olympics).

But mainly, as was pointed out above, because of his striking fighters generally have to do their shot from well outside touching range, giving him lots of time to react.

That's not necessarily true. You can be World-Class and never actually compete in the
Olympics. That aside Randy Couture was an alternate for the olmpics and outweighs BJ tremendously. Randy also helped train BJ for his first fight with Hughes, and he said BJ was one of the most difficult people to takedown that he ever encountered, and even when he was able to get him down he had an even harder time keeping him there; despite the large weight difference and everything else.

BJ is INCREDIBLY flexible and dexterous with his legs, and his balance is amazing to say the least. Sherk was actually putting his ass on the mat with single legs, but BJ could simply stretch out into a split and put his other leg where ever the fuck he needed to in order to nullify the takedown. He literally does a split and maintains balance and control.

lethalazn · 05-25-2008, 12:45 PM

I wouldn't exactly define it as a split.... Being able to do a split and being flexible in that area are two different things (hence BJ saying that he doesn't have kicking flexibility) BJ Penn basically stretches his hips out a lot (Yoga) and his ability to put his leg behind his head is pretty much what makes that motion really easy for him (combined with balance of course)

I've personally used what BJ used to sprawl against Matt Hughes in his 2nd fight during rolling sessions, only after being able to stretch my leg behind my head while sitting down. I would say you need a TON of flexibility to be able to do what BJ Penn did to defend the single leg from Sherk while standing up. BJ's reportedly able to reach his leg behind his head, standing up, without the use of his hands.... and I think most people aren't even going to attempt doing the sitting down version anytime soon