Breaking down the UFC Fight for the Troops 2 fights from a statistical point of view.
The three final fights at Saturday's UFC Fight Night for the Troops 2 were all quick ones, with Melvin Guillard, Matt Mitrione and Mark Hominick all winning their fights in under three minutes.
Let’s start with Mark Hominick’s performance against former training partner George Roop, that resulted in a unique distinction for the Canadian.
Looking at his fight’s breakdown, Hominick was actually outstruck by Roop 12-9 in the 88 seconds of their tilt. All of them were significant strikes (Sig Str) as the whole fight was contested in the middle of the Octagon or near the cage. They didn’t clinch and neither fighter was taken down (Roop failed in his only attempt).
Roop also threw twice as many punches (32-16); of course, that resulted in a lower striking efficiency (38 per cent vs. 56 per cent).
But perhaps most significant was the fact that Hominick managed to knock Roop down twice in the fight (KD). And with that he became just the fourth fighter in the UFC’s history to score at least two knockdowns in a fight in which he connected on under 10 total strikes, according to FightMetric. He joined Diego Sanchez (who did it vs. Joe Riggs), Drew McFedries (vs. Xavier Foupa-Pokam), and David (Tank) Abbott (vs. John Matua).
That suggests his strikes were strong and delivered with pinpoint accuracy and that he didn't waste any unnecessary energy. His power and effectiveness was clearly evidenced by the fact that Roop was wobbling for a good portion of the short contest. Indeed, referee Don Turnage was congnizant of this, as he stopped the fight when Roop was clearly not going to be able to continue to safely defend Hominick’s strikes.
The main event and co-main event fights were very similar in nearly every statistical aspect. Both fights ended just prior to the three-minute mark (2:58 and 2:59 respectively), so for the sake of simplicity, we’ll say each fight went an even 3:00 (it’s all based on when the timekeeper "hits the button" anyway).
Both fighters were essentially finished on their feet.
Technically, the final knee to Dunham’s head before referee Mario Yamasaki waved it off was illegal because Dunham’s knee had touched the ground a split-second earlier. But let’s assume Yamasaki had already made the motion toward ending the fight because that’s where it was headed anyway.
Now let’s look a little more closely at the numbers.
Guillard and Mitrione dominated both in terms of volume of strikes thrown and landing efficiency (Str%).
Each winner threw 3.3 as many significant strikes as his opponent:
33-10 for Guillard
27-8 for Mitrione
And each had an overwhelming advantage in the number of strikes landed:
17-2 for Guillard
16-3 for Mitrione
Further displaying how each was able to completely overcome their opponent was their efficiency in total strikes:
Guillard was 28-for-44 (64 per cent) while Dunham was 2-for-10 (20 per cent)
Mitrione was 16-for-27 (61 per cent) while Hague was 4-for-9 (44 per cent)
Each also had two knockdowns en route to their TKO victories.
Dunham did manage one takedown (TD) out of six attempts, but he couldn’t do a thing with it. In fact, Guillard was 11-for-11 in jabs from up close (the clinch or on the ground) with Dunham landing none (compare Tot Str to Sig Str).
Here’s one final comparison: total strikes per minute for the three winners on the night (with significant strikes per minute in parentheses):
Guillard 9.33 (5.67)
Mitrione 5.67 (5.33)
Hominick 6.13 (6.13)
While these last rates are not overwhelmingly high, it shows that the three fighters were efficient and effective with the punches they threw.
The numbers obviously don't tell the whole story when it comes to an MMA fight. But they can give you a general picture of how it went down, and in the case of these three they were pretty accurate snapshots.
