What on Earth is Overeem doing?

He showed a big decline in this last fight. Age might have finally caught up with him.
 
He's more frustrating than JDS to watch. I legit don't know what his gameplan is when watching. He seems to have a lot of bad habits from K-1/kickboxing and they don't translate well to MMA. Covering up against the cage and letting guys wail on you rarely works out and he seems to get himself into that situation every single fight. When he's on the ground, he turtles and covers up until the onslaught ends. It's intelligently defending but looks bad and makes refs want to step in that you are done.

His ground game and fundamentals are great but it seems like he's more concerned about throwing wacky strikes and running away from damage. I really think it's a confidence issue. You saw a clear change in how he fought after the Bigfoot loss and his body changing. He showed no fear and bullied guys before. Now, he turns his back and runs away or turtles when someone comes after him.
 
tramendous said:
He has brutal knees. Dont know why he doesnt clinch and fire them off. He also has a good ground game that he doesnt use as much as he should.
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hard to do against taller opponents. Volkov was too tall for reem to get good knees in.
 
Bigfoot took a few years off his life. It’s his choice on how long to keep fighting, but I hope he retires for his own sake.
 
If your so sure then why don't you go in there and prove it?
 
Volkov was teetering and backfooting slightly when Overeem did push forward. Volkov even visibly backed in the second and Overeem took a conscious moment to press it, although it was so quickly shot down.
 
I’ve always hated his shelling up technique because a lot of times it gets him knocked out, I remember vs Bigfoot, He did the old shell up and was knocked into outer space.
 
15089371 said:
Going hard is what got him the first losses in the ufc. His style has transformed into a bit of weird thing, but it's effective quite a lot too. He's just not good enough for the guys at the top.
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He’s kind of trying to emulate what Arlovski is doing but being way less successful and turtling up too much. Arlovski is fighting intelligently and still throwing some combos rather than just one over hand and immediately turtling when he doesn’t land.
 
Toothlessjoe said:
His strategy just isn't working. For a veteran it's so weird.

He's been using that pull off to the side + throwing a looping left, arcing left for a few fights now, it's what he threw when Francis sent him to the moon. He must have so many uncommon techniques to catch out HWs, but this isn't one that works yet he keeps going to it.

I get the shelling up too, he knows HWs gas quickly, so they dump energy as they try to pummel him, but he just can't seem to absorb it before they gas.

He should just go for broke every fight to be honest, I'd give him better odds.
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Going for broke when he has zero chin, a bad shell-up defense and overrated KO power isn't exactly a winning strategy. Retirement is his best move, but if he must fight, the Econoreem strategy is his best bet.
 
usernamee said:
You should be surprised he still remembers how to throw a 1-2 after all the damage he has taken.

Yet here he is actually still winning fights in the UFC.

That guy is fucking special.

Anyways, please retire Reem.
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Yeah his chin is gone and his game seems to centre around protecting it at all costs. Anything at ALL costs (besides freedom, maybe) is always risky.
 
Toothlessjoe said:
His strategy just isn't working. For a veteran it's so weird.

He's been using that pull off to the side + throwing a looping left, arcing left for a few fights now, it's what he threw when Francis sent him to the moon. He must have so many uncommon techniques to catch out HWs, but this isn't one that works yet he keeps going to it.

I get the shelling up too, he knows HWs gas quickly, so they dump energy as they try to pummel him, but he just can't seem to absorb it before they gas.

He should just go for broke every fight to be honest, I'd give him better odds.
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Very accurate analysis. And yeah, I'm amazed whenever his "standing, facing turtle" ends up working out. But it's a friggin dangerous game to play, and guys like Volkov (volume, accurate) are not the one's to play it with. . . especially when a stiff breeze buckles your knees.
 
Toothlessjoe said:
His strategy just isn't working. For a veteran it's so weird.

He's been using that pull off to the side + throwing a looping left, arcing left for a few fights now, it's what he threw when Francis sent him to the moon. He must have so many uncommon techniques to catch out HWs, but this isn't one that works yet he keeps going to it.

I get the shelling up too, he knows HWs gas quickly, so they dump energy as they try to pummel him, but he just can't seem to absorb it before they gas.

He should just go for broke every fight to be honest, I'd give him better odds.
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To be fair, he won that exchange with Francis until he didn't ;) he actually got there first
 
kingghidrah said:
For a K-1 champ he sure doesn't seem to want to engage in kickboxing.

What happened to his kicks? He used to have legit power that people feared.

MMA-fighter-kicks-girl.gif
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His kicks slowly went away more and more after he stopped eating horsemeat.:(
[url=https://postimages.org/][/URL]
 
mkt said:
Going for broke when he has zero chin, a bad shell-up defense and overrated KO power isn't exactly a winning strategy. Retirement is his best move, but if he must fight, the Econoreem strategy is his best bet.
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This. He doesn't bully and move forward all the time now because his fight ending power isn't close to what it was. It would be a suicidal strategy most of the time. He just doesn't have it anymore. He is only effective if he gets on top and he doesn't have the wrestling to get there. He used to be a glass cannon. Now he isn't so much of a cannon and that's a bad combo. He realized his limitations/regressions and he fought around them for a few years after his prime ended but now he has fallen off to the point he really shouldn't be out there. He doesn't need the money, or shouldn't...
 
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Senzo Tanaka said:
He's more frustrating than JDS to watch. I legit don't know what his gameplan is when watching.
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have you ever fought or coached before? I thought not. JDS punches into the wind.
it was clear for Reem to attack the lead leg then throw a looping left hand with the intent of a KO or to better position himself into a clinch to transition to the ground. plan failed horribly. please retire reem. to think this guy picked up Bigfoot and threw him across the cage is too much heart ache
 
Toothlessjoe said:
His strategy just isn't working. For a veteran it's so weird.

He's been using that pull off to the side + throwing a looping left, arcing left for a few fights now, it's what he threw when Francis sent him to the moon. He must have so many uncommon techniques to catch out HWs, but this isn't one that works yet he keeps going to it.

I get the shelling up too, he knows HWs gas quickly, so they dump energy as they try to pummel him, but he just can't seem to absorb it before they gas.

He should just go for broke every fight to be honest, I'd give him better odds.
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It's a common trait among aging fighters. I think it's an accumulation of a bunch of things. Maybe undisclosed injuries/setbacks make that the most optimal way they can fight. Body just stops working the same way as when they were healhier/younger.

Similar situation happened with Cro Cop late in his mma run. He would constantly turtle up if pressured, shove opponents away, same telegraphed combos in every fight. Both were high level kickboxers too and it was really confusing for the longest time why he was fighting like this.
 
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