Controlling the Scramble Grappler: UFC 296
Grappling Highlights from UFC 296 With a Dash of Charles Oliveira
The final UFC event of the year took place some weeks ago, and it went off with a small pop. A fairly tepid event with consequential matchups abound, it did not live up to the expectations many had for it. Champions defended, old men were defeated, nothing was truly surprising.
What struck me most from this event was Paddy Pimblett’s depressing inability to finish Tony Ferguson.
Given Pimblett’s lack of tact in fighting the veteran Ferguson I was reminded of two fights. Two fights later champion Alexandre Pantoja had an entertaining and largely dominant match against a similarly scramble-heavy grappler in Brandon Royval, and years prior Charles Oliveira had his star-making performance in a grappling domination of the very same man Pimblett faced.
If anything, Pimblett can learn from the performances of Pantoja and Oliveira in how to control, advance, and do damage against grapplers who like to attempt submissions from their back, force scrambles, and spazz out with offense from every position. I dub them: Scramble Grapplers. Where did Pimblett go wrong, and where did the two more accomplished fighters succeed?
Disclaimer: The video clips included in this article are not owned by the author. They are included for educational purposes only to illustrate key moments in the fighter’s career and demonstrate aspects of mixed martial arts techniques and strategies. All rights to the video content belong to their respective owners.
Takedowns
Before controlling the grappler, they need to be put to the ground. Tony Ferguson was always famed for his offense off of his back and ability to snatch up a D’Arce while being taken down. At this stage of his career he is a different man.
Pimblett is able to turn the corner on one the lazier single-leg attempts I have seen (given how gassed he was by the third round) and Ferguson is able to turn in just enough to prevent the takedown. Pimblett’s strength and size for the division are quite underrated however as he picks up Ferguson and slams him to the ground.
Charles Oliveira was able to do this much more impressively against a slightly less worn version of Tony Ferguson without getting hurt by him in the process. Instead of diving on the single in an all-or-nothing attempt Oliveira cinches up the body lock in order to drive Ferguson to the cage. These moments along the cage give Oliveira time to adjust his grips and shove his knee under Ferguson’s shin.
With his body lock tightened and knee holding up Ferguson’s leg, he lifts Ferguson up and slams him down. Notably utilizing the body lock rather than single leg puts Oliveira into a more advantageous position while on top. Scramble grapplers like Ferguson either:
Elbow from the guard
Submit from the guard —> positional changes
Put their feet on the hips to create space and get/wrestle up
Though Ferguson is apt to play a more traditional guard at this point in his career changing position through offense used to be a cornerstone of his game. In finishing the takedown directly into side control, Oliveira prevents Ferguson’s feet from framing off the hips and creating space.
Even when Oliveira gets lower into the double-leg he makes sure to clear Ferguson’s legs mid-air to end up in side control. Oliveira always get his high-side knee right into the hip to keep them from turning in and regaining guard. Where Pimblett allows Ferguson to play guard and attempt submissions, Oliveira eliminates the problem entirely.
(On a completely unrelated note, the kick catch being elevated into a takedown is so effortless and cheeky)
Once Oliveira establishes pressure on the hip as Ferguson tries to sneak a knee in, Oliveira steps over Ferguson’s into (almost) mount and maintains pressure on Ferguson’s top half to prevent him from utilizing his butterfly hook.
Pantoja also exhibited some beautifully timed takedowns against the similarly scrambly Brandon Royval. Given Pantoja’s smaller frame compared to his opponent a trip double takedown was the more attractive option. He has to contend with Royval’s open guard but Pantoja could pass it much more reliably than Pimblett was able to.
Pantoja does his best work by sliding to the back. Catching kicks is a great way to get the opponent to turn around where Pantoja grabs the back body lock. The back is Pantoja’s win condition but Royval turns in, where Pantoja takes him down into side control.
Though you can try and pass the guard, taking your opponent down directly into side control with a tight body lock makes it much easier to keep control. Eliminating the legs takes away half of their toolset to attempt submissions, attack, or escape. If you do find yourself dealing with the opponent’s open guard get their head to the fence and begin stacking them.
Stacking
When attempting to stack Tony Ferguson, Pimblett allows his head to be wrapped in a double collar tie while Ferguson pushes his knee in the neck of his opponent. Ferguson keeps his feet framed off Pimblett’s hips to maintain space as well. Pimblett desperately tries to clear Ferguson’s legs and throw some ground and pound to advance position. He is almost entirely ineffective in the position Ferguson holds him in.
A few years prior, Ferguson tries this same exact technique as Oliveira takes him down along the cage. Ferguson was a little more active in attempting to throw elbows after holding onto the head of his opponent but it did not matter. In stark contrast to Pimblett, Oliveira immediately begins shimmying his hips to clear Ferguson’s foot frames.
Now that Ferguson’s frames are broken Oliveira pushes forward using his knees to elevate the legs above the head. This is what good stacking looks like. Oliveira keeps his head and weight down and then takes the opportunity to grab Ferguson’s ankles and perform an underpass: where you bring your opponent’s feet up and over their head while in guard.
Ferguson performs an illegal up-kick before Oliveira can start working but this position is much more advantageous than the one Pimblett was attempting to work from.
When back in this position Oliveira keeps one of Ferguson’s feet in the fence and forces a knee shield with no leverage, eliminating Ferguson tools to attack or change position. Once Ferguson stills, Oliveira throws a violent elbow to Ferg’s dome. Oliveira follows Ferguson’s attempts to roll while clearing the legs to get a body lock in North-South.
I love how Oliveira starts this sequence. While underpassing Ferguson again, he slides his knee over Ferguson’s arm to control 3/4 of his limbs. Olives tries to throw strikes from here but Ferguson’s legs are still in the way. He opts to grab a rear waist cinch and slide into North-South. Oliveira played between the underpass and North-South whenever Ferg wanted to climb the cage with his feet. When Ferguson’s head is near the cage Oliveira controls the legs and makes Ferguson eat his own knees.
Be a rock while on top, and a feather when they move. Against the fence stacking is the best option to keep the man under you from leveraging any offense. In open space the guard needs to be contended with.
Passing
Pimblett’s most potent weapon in mixed martial arts is his submission grappling. If that is the case then he has a lot to work on.
Pimblett opts to work from the body lock after Ferguson creates enough space with his frames and butterfly hooks. In a poor imitation of Nicky Rod he tries to step over Ferguson’s knees to pass the guard. Ferguson is able to maintain knee shields and eventually regain his guard preventing the pass.
While Pimblett often ended up in the guard of Ferguson, Oliveira took him down directly into side control. With a near waist lock and head on Ferguson’s far hip, Oliveira dug his knee into Ferguson’s side, immobilizing him from turning in or out. When Oliveira was comfortable he easily stepped over into mount. A gorgeous pass from side control.
While in mount Ferguson tried to give his back. Though this is seen as “bad” in traditional BJJ, rolling to your knees in order to stand up is absolutely a viable way to escape the mount (Especially with wrestlers like Ferguson who trained for years to roll, stand up, break grips, and separate).
Rather than allow Ferguson to roll and attempt to take the back, Oliveira eschews the risk of losing control of his opponent. Oliveira peels Ferguson off of him and drops down some hellish elbows, forcing Ferguson to roll to his knees. Oliveira follows Ferguson and digs his bottom leg to keep their hips “kissing”. Oliveira maintains his mount and can start the sequence over if he so chooses.
Alexandre Pantoja’s guard passing against Brandon Royval was a standout skill at UFC 296. Pantoja worked the near entirety of his performance on top of Royval in half-guard. Royval is a similarly athletic fighter to Ferguson in grappling ability. Royval has a number of submission wins on his record wrought by his quick thinking and aggression.
Pantoja is a different animal altogether and choked Royval to a submission in their first meeting. Though he only gave up his back once in this fight, Royval was able to consistently force half guard and prevent Pantoja from maintaining mount. Royval had a big hole in his approach in that he only had one or two ideas in trying to get up from his half guard.
Royval fought valiantly with frames on Pantoja’s neck, knees, and hip. Pantoja was able to break past every defensive maneuver of his opponent. Pantoja kept one knee in Royval’s ass and stood over his opponent. Though Pantoja’s upper body was far from Royval’s, his knee eliminated space between their hips as he drove forward with his standing leg.
Pantoja consistently weaved from side to side to break Royval’s frames, dropping one elbow to post against Royval’s far side hip. Once he had this elbow Royval’s movement options were limited and he drove his standing knee forward to clear Royval’s knee and finish the sequence in an incomplete half guard, driving Royval’s head into the cage. Now that Royval’s head is immobilized he can take his time and work at his own pace.
Maintaining proper head positioning along the cage is an integral component of immobilization. Royval kept distance between himself and Pantoja with a flurry of up kicks and the moment he decided to stand up Pantoja drove forward and used his head to pin Royval’s own against the cage. He easily cleared Royval’s knee shield and flattened Royval into half guard.
Royval seemingly had an opportunity to turn in and wrestle up with a single leg but Pantoja was a step ahead at all times. Before Royval can solidify a grip around his leg Pantoja spins into side control on the opposite side to establish a cross-face and hip post to dash Royval’s hopes of standing up.
Pantoja was similarly effective as Oliveira in punishing his opponent turning to the knees to stand up. With one knee in Royval’s side and one arm around his far hip Pantoja effortlessly slides into mount after forcing Royval to turn with an elbow to the head.
Pantoja gets on one foot and uses it as a post on Royval’s hip while immobilizing the head with a cross-face and his own head, stopping Royval’s scramble in its tracks. Royval impressively gets half guard from here but is stuck in the same flaccid position that he found himself in throughout the entire fight.
Once the guard has been passed control must be established to keep the opponent from attacking or standing up. We have already seen Pantoja and Oliveira effectively use hip posts and head pressure to immobilize parts of their opponent’s bodies. Lets see where Pimblett went wrong against Old Man Tony and what other tricks the genius Brazilians used to control their coked up grappling savants.
Control
Compared to Oliveira’s and Pantoja’s guard passing, Pimblett’s is obvious and labored.
Pimblett attempts to maintain head and constant forward pressure on Tony’s hip frames. Given the state of Ferguson’s grappling at this point Pimblett is able to simply muscle past Ferguson’s guard into half, but he is not quick enough to prevent Tony from framing off of his head to throw an elbow. Though now in flattened half guard Pimblett opts to stay in this ineffective position.
Compare this sequence to Oliveira. While Pimblett seems to be reacting to Tony’s defense Oliveira is a step ahead of Ferguson’s reactions.
Ferguson is wise to Oliveira’s attempts to pass the guard so Oliveira flattens out on Ferguson’s head with the cross-face to prevent Ferguson from getting his legs involved. Oliveira switches his cross-face grip into a North-South choke and drives his head into Ferguson’s far hip with a waist cinch. Ferguson desperately tries to climb off the fence with his feet. No matter how much Tony attempted to scramble Oliveira flowed during movement and kept concentrated pressure on one area of Ferguson’s body at a time.
While Pimblett struggles with the Ferguson’s lockdown, Oliveira makes it look like a poor attempt to stall. Hard to see from this angle but Oliveira uses his free leg to break open the lockdown and slowly slide into side control. Oliveira maintains heavy chest pressure and a tight grip around Ferguson’s head the ENTIRE time he is passing from half-guard into side control.
Oliveira beautifully marries his immobilizing techniques with strikes here. Ferguson has a butterfly hook and Oliveira a grapevine so their legs are in a stalemate. Oliveira is driving something into Tony’s chin at all times. He uses his head to pin Tony’s own and throw punches and shoulder strikes, replacing his head with the shoulder and back again whilst clearing Ferguson’s framing arms. Oliveira works slowly at first and elbows Ferguson quickly to grab a cross-face and pin Ferguson’s shoulders to the mat.
As Ferguson tried to create space Oliveira attacked, and as he defended Oliveira put the pressure back on.
Once Oliveira established a tight cross-face he was able to more freely move his legs without allowing Ferguson the opportunity to create space with his upper body. Oliveira steps over Ferguson’s butterfly hook to hook the far leg, ending up in side control. Rather than passing completely Oliveira slides the knee to mount Ferg. Ferguson is finally able to get to his knees but Oliveira’s cross-face is simply too tight. Rather than insert hooks and take the back Oliveira posts out and uses his leg to roll Ferguson back into mount.
Oliveira’s chest pressure and grapevines stall Ferguson from doing anything effective. He looks like a toddler throwing a tantrum. Once the tantrum subsides Oliveira slides his knees up to put his hips on Ferguson’s chest. While the initial position makes Ferguson wholly ineffective, Oliveira moves into a position where he can enact offense.
Pimblett could barely pass Ferguson’s guard as is and the few times he had any success Ferguson’s frames prevented him from doing anything significant. Pimblett had isolated moments of damage against Ferguson but it was not nearly as clinical as the work completed by Pantoja and Olivera.
Ground & Pound
This was Pimblett’s sole instance of effective ground and pound. In the opposite fashion to his betters Pimblett struck Ferguson from the back in order to force him into mount. From the mount Paddy simply swung on Ferguson, forcing him to move and roll just enough to survive until the end of the round.
Pimblett was also able to get some isolated moments of success while in Ferguson’s guard, quickly blocked after he landed a few good shots. Pimblett did not have a process in playing between his ground and pound and advancing position. When he was trying to advance, he was trying to advance. When he was trying to damage, he was only trying to damage.
Pimblett really struggled in most instances with Ferguson’s frames which either blocked or disrupted his offense. When he did try to advance position while attacking he flailed around like a baby deer. Even Trump in the back disapproves.
Now lets look at Oliveira’s ground and pound. Rather than flailing like a baby, Oliveira stills Ferguson so that he cannot frame and push off Oliveira to disrupt the offense.
Oliveira punches in Ferguson in transition, brings his knees to his own face, and uses these moments while maintaining top pressure on Ferguson to attack deliberately. None of his strikes are wasted.
Using this underpass and North-South position was integral in stalling Ferguson from scrambling around. Oliveira created moments to attack without running into defense. One of my absolute favorite moments of offense was while Oliveira stacked Ferguson against the cage. After attacking with some light body shots, Oliveira keeps pressure on Ferguson’s legs and stabs a gorgeous knee into Ferguson’s mid-section. What is so great about Oliveira’s performance is that even after committed attacks he does not lose position. Smother and attack and smother.
Oliveira sees the opportunity for more body knees as Ferguson reaches for an ill-advised Buggy Choke. A buggy choke, a gimmicky submission, does prevent the man on top from doing anything significant in grappling. In MMA it opens the perfect opportunity to tenderize some organs. They will be forced to let the choke go lest the want to forfeit the fight.
Pantoja also had some beautiful transitional offense at UFC 296. After bringing his un-trapped leg in to loosen Royval’s lockdown, he grabs Royval by the throat to pin his head and throw some heavy hammer fists. Royval is forced to frame off and create space but his commitment to throwing hammers from the bottom gives Pantoja the opportunity to get outside Royval’s legs and keep him pinned to the ground.
Pantoja’s choke hold works wonders yet again. One hand on the throat keeps Royval’s head pinned to the mat so he can unload some hammers on the dome. Royval tries to escape out the back door and come up on a single but Pantoja’s throat grip and knee behind the head keep Royval in place long enough until the end of the round.
Pantoja fights like an absolute mad man but his considered ground and pound from Royval’s open guard was a nice surprise to see. Anytime Royval had his open guard he spastically up-kicked to keep Pantoja off of him. Pantoja would time his entries between Royval’s kicks to throw strong, committed shots to Royval’s body and head. Anytime Pantoja did not like Royval’s kicks he separated and reset.
Both Oliveira and Pantoja’s ability to damage and control was contingent upon their ability to flow when necessary and stay heavy at all other times. Against a man who scrambles to open up opportunities, the ability to move with them and stay connected is absolutely essential to nullifying their grappling.
Flowing with the Scramble
In recent fights Ferguson has opted to play guard, so Pimblett did not actually have to exhibit his ability to scramble with the aged fighter. Ferguson was able to hold Pimblett in his guard without much action from the man on top.
When Oliveira was met with Ferguson stalling while mounted, he pushed his hand into Ferguson’s forehead and landed nice elbows in the space between.
Though Ferguson was not in his prime he was still able to execute some cheeky escapes against Oliveira. Olives’ strongest weapon here was his ability to stay calm, and roll Ferguson off his shoulders to get back on top despite a cool ass back attack from his opponent.
Pantoja’s cool demeanor was also integral to his success. He is not bothered by Royval’s desperate elbows and pushes forward over Royval’s knee with cinch around the body to grab the cross face and flatten Royval’s shoulders and legs. He knew his assignment to flatten Royval and executed.
This was lovely. Royval pushes off the cage to off-balance Pantoja and come up on a single. Rather than simply put his weight down Pantoja spins around to Royval’s back after he turns to his knees to keep working from his most preferred position.
Oliveira himself can be quite the proficient scramble grappler. The mistake most of these kinds of fighters make is that they sell out on their submissions from the bottom. Even though Oliveira has a tight triangle he opts to elbow, forcing Ferguson to change positions. He takes comes up on top to work from side control.
Oliveira got to this triangle position by flowing with Ferguson’s attempts to walk off the cage. He stays on top for as long as he can but realizes that though the back is open he has the arm isolated, and sits to a triangle. He got the submission and ended up on bottom, rather than putting himself on bottom and then working to submit.
Pantoja eliminated Royval’s attempts to frame and elevate with butterfly hooks. Pantoja is not all forward motion like many of Pimblett’s attempts to attack Ferguson. When he sees Royval attempting to elevate he slides back and out to the side to pass into half guard. Pantoja kept his head low, ignoring the offense of Royval, and drove to improve his position rather than explicitly defending against the paltry offense of his opponent.
Royval and Ferguson both had the idea to push off the cage to invert and force movement while being immobilized from the top. Pantoja is like a rock. From his cross-face and waist cinch he is only forced away for a moment while on his knees and Royval’s attempt at changing positions looks childish in hindsight.
I did not rate Pimblett’s abilities all that favorably before his fight with Ferguson but this utterly depressing affair only confirmed my assumptions. Thought he hurt Ferguson badly and controlled him from the top for the majority of the fight, he was constantly getting punched in the face when standing and was mostly ineffective in enacting his own offense. Ferguson is one of my favorite fighters of all time, but given Pimblett’s size and perceived ability, he should have ran through him much easier at this point in his career.
Pimblett’s impotent offense against Ferguson stood in stark contrast to Oliveira’s own match with the veteran, only aided by the fact that it is one of the more entertaining grapple-heavy performances from a technical perspective. Royval and Pantoja’s match stood as a parallel of two high-level grapplers fighting between control and motion.
If you are dealing with a spastic grappler it is imperative that can tense and relax at a moments notice. Rock on top, feather in motion. Keeping an opponent guessing between well-timed ground and pound and positional improvements are key to stalling the motion of the man on bottom and maintaining a steady stream of damage. Many will try to simply hold them down as long as they can like Pimblett did, but a younger man will eventually force enough damage or motion from the bottom that a hard-headed top player will find himself with a whirling dervish of a man flowing around him.
What strategies do you employ when trying to control and win against grapplers such as this? Let me know what you learned, and I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year.
-Kick
