UFC 300 Technical Preview: The Lightweights and Weili Zhang

A look at some of the strategies and tactics in several of the important bouts below the main event.

Stacked Top to Bottom

The UFC has decided to put most of its eggs in the one basket of its 300th pay-per-view event, but the result is a fight card saturated with intrigue from the first fight to the last.

But that means that for this preview, rather than diving deep into one bout, we’ll take a quick look at some of the most important technical aspects to keep in mind for several of the most tantalizing matchups.

Justin Gaethje vs Max Holloway

Undoubtedly the best fight on the card, Max Holloway makes his second foray into the lightweight division to take on perennial top contender Justin Gaethje. It’s hard to imagine that this fight is anything but bell-to-bell violence and action. Despite both fighters’ well-known offensive potency, this is a fight that is likely to be defined by their defensive liabilities instead.

Holloway has been one of the most consistently elite fighter we’ve ever seen, having maintained his spot as either the number one or number two in the featherweight division since he won the interim title in December of 2016. However, he is not without his weaknesses, as his three losses to Alexander Volkanovski clearly demonstrated. But even in his two most recent victories, his defensive vulnerabilities created some issues.

The former featherweight champion is a phenomenally gifted offensive fighter, seamlessly switching stances and mixing up his targets to the head and body while closing opponents down and maneuvering deftly to advantageous angles. But when opponents come after him, he often backs straight up.

Holloway is most vulnerable when he backs straight up and opponents able to cover distance quickly can catch him when he thinks he’s out of range.

This is an issue that Gaethje looks well-suited to exploit. He showed against Dustin Poirier, whose southpaw stance naturally increased the distance, that he’s quite capable of staying on the outside with his lateral movement and kicks before exploding in with shifting combinations.

Gaethje is the natural lightweight and has demonstrated considerable power in his punches, and even though Holloway possesses otherworldly durability, it seems likely that he’ll at least get stumbled a few times like in his fight with Poirier. The fact that Gaethje will likely be the one with the biggest single moments of offense, it will make winning rounds difficult for Holloway, who could see minutes of clean offense wiped away by a single thunderous strike from Gaethje.

But I don’t think Gaethje is the only one with the potential to land fight-changing punches here. He too has some fundamental holes in his defense that Holloway will look to punish. For Gaethje, his biggest defensive issues are his lack of positional discipline in extended exchanges, his propensity for overthrowing, and his habit of ducking down in response to nearly every threat that comes his way.

Gaethje has a tendency to square his stance in exchanges or duck down. Both are habits that Holloway can look to punish.

These issues are really only a surface level analysis of the matchup and in reality you could endlessly try to peel back the layers and probably still not come to a definitive conclusion. There’s much that could be said, including detailing Holloway’s rhythm manipulation, body punching, adjustments, pace, pressure, and grappling versus Gaethje’s leg kicks, head kicks, left hooks, and collar ties.

Given all of this, the fight seems like a real tossup. But I’m going to trust Holloway’s durability to hold up and allow him to leverage his 5-round experience to find ways around Gaethje’s venomous striking. The weight could be a factor, but Holloway has had more time to prepare for his second lightweight fight than he had for his first one.

There’s a possibility that Gaethje can reproduce a backfoot boxing performance similar to Volkanovksi, but there’s almost no way he doesn’t often end up at close range winging the hardest shots imaginable. In those instance, I think Holloway will get caught a few times, but he’ll keep dragging Gaethje into more exchanges, keep hitting the body and moving around him, and ultimately snowball his offense to win the latter half of the fight. Holloway by decision.

Charles Oliveira vs Arman Tsarukyan

Another potential title eliminator, both Oliveira and Tsarukyan are looking to earn a chance to avenge their losses to the champion, Islam Makhachev. As is typical with matchups between elite lightweights, this one contains a great deal of depth as well as violent potential with both fighters possessing potencies and vulnerabilities in every phase.