Stipe Miocic is widely regarded as one of the greatest MMA heavyweights of all time. He's beaten legends of the sport in Fabricio Werdum, Alistair Overeem, Junior dos Santos and Daniel Cormier. He's also beaten his opponent on Saturday night at UFC 260, Francis Ngannou.
In their first meeting, Miocic found a way to neutralize Ngannou by taking him to the ground. Sure, he took a number of significant strikes from Ngannou, but Miocic's all-around abilities stopped Ngannou in his tracks, tired him out and led to a clear unanimous decision victory.
But this Ngannou isn't the same foe he was in 2018. After losing to Miocic, Ngannou figured out the holes not in just his game but also his life. He hired a team around him, changed his training habits and has thrived as a result. He's on a streak of four consecutive first-round knockouts, which all occurred in the first 71 seconds. Ngannou earned this second title opportunity, and he's ready to make the most of it.
Meanwhile, Miocic has spent his time in the Octagon since that Ngannou fight against one man -- Cormier. The heavyweight trilogy wrapped up last August, and while it was entertaining for most of the world, it forced Ngannou to wait his turn.
Miocic has shown fantastic development in his own right, by making key in-fight adjustments against one of the best in the sport in Cormier.
Come Saturday night, will wrestling be a big part of Miocic's plan once again? Will Ngannou's training with welterweight champion Kamaru Usman make a difference on that front and, most important, will his cardio keep up if he needs it?
ESPN MMA analyst Gilbert Melendez examines the heavyweight title fight and what each fighter must do to emerge with the gold.
The big picture
What this fight really comes down to is what kind of adjustments Ngannou has made to be able to defeat Miocic.
I believe Miocic will approach this fight in the same way as their first confrontation. He'll be light on his feet, use good boxing combinations, try to time Ngannou's over-aggression, level change and look to shoot takedowns. Then Miocic will ride him on top, hold him down and tire him out. Miocic cannot get overanxious and use all his energy to try to finish Ngannou with a submission attempt or ground and pound.
Miocic was very tactical in the first fight, absorbing some punishment but ultimately going back to the takedowns to get Ngannou to the ground, where he could control his opponent. He didn't go nuts on the finishing attempts in that fight because Miocic knew Ngannou was durable. That hasn't changed.
Despite the loss, Ngannou was impressive, because we saw his gas tank go immediately in the first round, but he still was in the fight until the last second. Ngannou is always dangerous with his big, heavy hands, and he also can absorb a lot of punishment. Even on the takedowns and in grappling, Ngannou was so big that Miocic couldn't really grab a hold of him the way he wanted to. Miocic's ground game, while immensely successful in that fight, didn't reach the levels of success he's had with other opponents.
So, did Ngannou change enough to claim the gold?
How does Miocic win?
Even though he's the champion, Miocic is at a disadvantage in this rematch. What he did against Ngannou the first time worked! From that perspective, he has no clear adjustments to make.
However, he needs to go to the drawing board with his team to figure out what to anticipate from Ngannou this time around. They should probably expect that Ngannou now has better takedown defense. The challenger has worked on getting out from bottom more intelligently and has improved his standup, which we've already seen in his past fights.
We didn't see every one of Miocic's tools in that first fight against Ngannou when it comes to takedowns, because we didn't see the proper reaction and counters from Ngannou to defend against Miocic's game plan. That said, Ngannou has most definitely focused on this, and I believe this fight could become more of a chain wrestling fight.
Miocic will attempt his combinations, level changes and shoots for a double leg, which worked the first time. But this time Ngannou will hit a whizzer, sprawl a little bit and force Miocic to make adjustments. Miocic needs to excel at chain wrestling in this fight to show everyone he has more wrestling ability than he offered in the first bout. He will have to demonstrate that he's three steps ahead of Ngannou, and that even if Ngannou had reacted appropriately in terms of defense in the first fight, that he still would have been ready for it. Expect Miocic to anticipate Ngannou's counters and show his true grappling capabilities.
Miocic also needs to have fantastic conditioning -- wrestling conditioning, specifically, for the reasons mentioned above. Knowing the power of Ngannou, feinting may draw Ngannou into his old, more reckless ways. That's what Miocic wants, to show he's playing chess while Ngannou is playing checkers.
Taking the wrestling approach out of the fight, Miocic can indeed win a striking battle by sticking and moving. He won't do that for the whole fight. That's not Miocic -- he's a warrior. He's going to get in there, take risks and mix it up. He'll hit Ngannou as hard as he can and fully expect to take some punches back.
But he can become this stick-and-mover, kick his opponent's legs and use his feet the whole fight -- the Floyd Mayweather approach -- and just outpoint Ngannou, if he chooses to. He's capable of doing that, and maybe we'll see that approach early in the first or second round, where he tries to tire Ngannou out with constant moving. After all, Ngannou is most dangerous at the start of the fight.
If Miocic utilizes that plan, I still expect him to pick it up in the final three rounds. All things considered, I expect Miocic will ultimately go out there and try to win a fight, not a point match.
How does Ngannou win?
Either his loss to Miocic has been fueling Ngannou, or he's put that moment in time in the back of his head. It will be important for Ngannou to push aside the memory that he could not knock out Miocic last time. He needs to come into this fight with a belief that he can win and not dwell on his past failure.
We've already discussed Ngannou's biggest priority -- making adjustments. The first place he started was his weight. He fought Miocic at 264 pounds the first time, but against dos Santos he was only 255 pounds. He's a leaner fighter now, lighter on his feet because of that, and I believe that will help him in this fight. It's easy to see the change in mobility when you look at tape from his past fights. He has a bounce in the cage, which allows him to be more fluid when moving about. I've seen him working on leg kicks as well, and there's no mystery about those -- it's just a giant leg coming to strike you.
Ngannou has had quick success throughout his career, and Saturday's fight will come down to his ability to avoid being overly aggressive with his striking. He needs to shorten his combinations and focus on defending the takedowns before he can knock out Miocic, which is an easier task once he neutralizes the takedowns. If he has that under control, he can start releasing his hands.
Some of the combinations I expect to see from Ngannou include the jab to right uppercut -- jabbing to make Miocic slip or duck, then a right uppercut to counter the shot or level change -- and also a right hand to left uppercut. The right hand would make his opponent slip or weave in or level change, and that's when the left uppercut would work. We've already seen him land that big uppercut against Overeem.
Ngannou has also gone for a five- or six-strike combo before, and it worked against Jairzinho Rozenstruik. I don't think that's the right idea against Miocic because that aggression against Miocic would get him taken down, but at the same time, with 30 seconds left in a round, I would play that game. If I'm Ngannou at the end of the round, I'm going to go ham, swing for the fences. One strike is all it takes, and that sort of approach could be detrimental for Miocic, who wants to control the fight.
In the first fight, Ngannou would attempt a 1-2 combination on Miocic and charge in. Miocic would then level change and take him down. Ngannou wasn't ready to defend because he was often just on the attack. Ngannou's sprawls were technically off and he needed to work on his whizzer, head placement and getting off the bottom. Ngannou has been focusing on improving his jiu-jitsu in Las Vegas, grappling with some of the sport's best ahead of this fight. He's often referred to as a good student, eager to learn.
One thing to remember is that Ngannou didn't get grounded and pounded or submitted in that first fight. He lasted all five rounds. And any time he was on his feet, he was dangerous with big combinations. Miocic may be the better striker, but at the end of the day, Ngannou has the advantage just because he's so powerful.
X factors:
The X factor for this fight is twofold: Can Miocic get the takedown? What has been the growth and development of Ngannou's takedown defense?
If Ngannou does get taken down, has he learned to get back up and succeed where he could not in 2018? If he can get back to his feet and neutralize the takedown more, he'll be able to start reading Miocic's striking and anticipate what his opponent will do. That will allow Ngannou to release his hands more.
Prediction:
This is a tough one. Miocic is the man, we've seen what he can do, but Ngannou was so impressive in lasting the five rounds against him in the last fight and Ngannou has had this time to step back and improve.
Miocic is the better fighter when it comes down to it, but size and durability do matter, and Ngannou has the power. I'm going with Ngannou, and the more skills he develops and the more pieces of the puzzle he fills in as a complete fighter are going to make him scarier and scarier for all of his opponents as his career goes on.