Brendan Fitzgerald and Sayif Saud preview the third installment of the epic trilogy between UFC welterweight champion Leon …
foreign [Applause] [Music] the trilogy is set as Leon Rocky Edwards looks to defend his UFC welterweight Championship when the Octagon returns to the UK for a massive UFC 286 here for the big preview as always the general safe South what a Trilogy this has been kamaru Usman won the first one Leon Edwards The Comeback of the year The Knockout heard around the worlds and now the trilogy stage is set unbelievable Brennan High drama happening in England we’ve got the methodical Striker now the champion Leon Edwards who’s rounded out his game worked on his wrestling can he defend the Bell against the former pound for pound number one Kamara Usman had a dominant Reign he was reaching that welterweight goat status he was in the talk with the GSP and then all of a sudden fifth round bang headshot as Leon particularly said it ends that whole thing can Camaro come back can he regain the title in England I cannot wait to watch it go down all right UFC 278 is when they matched up in 2022 UFC breakdown you can go back and watch that episode when safe masterfully you know went through the games of each of these ones on this special edition we’re going fight focus and we’re going to break down in detail each of their first two matchups we’ll start with fight one way back in 2015. yeah Brennan let’s take a look at fight one these guys are early in their careers here there are a couple fights in the UFC and you know they’re just kind of trying to find who they really are here you can see Kamara right away rushing to the takedown getting in this position because at this point in his career he was more of a wrestler right he had just started kind of finding a striking game this is where he was comfortable right away out the gates he grabs Leon you can see Leon trying to frame and get away from him but this is kind of who Camaro was so let’s remember that because as we go and look at the next fight how much they’ve evolved really is interesting when you watch both of these fights so you see Kamara right out the gates grabbing Leon trying to hold on to him and Leon does a good job early in this fight of kind of keeping Camaro off you can tell that he was prepared he knew Camaro was going to come in heavy but as the fight starts to progress you see kamaru start walking it in and I want to take a look at this and bring this down let’s just watch Camaro here as he’s moving forward so we know we know that Leon has backed up but look at this little side step I want to look at this in in detail and I want to talk about this because Camaro does this over and over again so we know Leon’s out of the picture but he’s backed up against the cage but kamaru is going to head this way and he’s going to do it with his feet he’s going to hit a little Shuffle and what he’s doing Brennan is he’s cutting off where Leon is gonna go so you can see that little step right there he’s cutting off where Leon is heading and when we let this play a little bit we get closer okay we’ll see that he corralled him forward right Leon was trying to escape this way but with that side step that Camaro took he lined himself up right and kept Leon where he was and he does this over and over again he’s constantly corralling Leon and so now he’s going to throw the kick right and he Corrals Leon keeps him in that spot and here we go again now we’re against the fence this happens over and over again you’ll see Camaro pressure Leon try to put him against the fence whether with strikes or with footwork so this is again early in the fight Leon’s Against the Cage he’s got wrist control right here he breaks away so he still hasn’t gotten taken down yet he’s still in there Landing some shots and let’s talk about this right here because here comes that left head kick which we’ve seen before let’s take a look at this so one thing that happens here and we take this away from the first fight is Camaro drifts to the right a little bit against Leon and this side is Leon’s left side as he’s a southpaw he’s got the left hand and the left kick and Leon notices this in the first fight and you’ll see here as kamaru drifts to that power side Leon throws some shots here and gets Kamar right there but you can see right here Leon sees him dipping down to that side he sees kamaru’s head is this way right in front of all of his power his left hand and his left leg and so just with a little reaction you’re going to see Leon throw this left head kick but you’re going to see camarge just get his hand up right Camaro just gets enough of that to block it and when you look at this kick this is a lot of foot right he still lands it but he just barely kind of hits him with it with the InStep he doesn’t hit him with the shin and the truth is this is where we want to hit but you can see Leon making that little mental note whenever Kamara will shift to that side Leon will throw either a left hand or a left kick and that will be a very important Point as we move forward so let’s keep going here Leon’s Landing shots Camaro’s Landing shots you can see Camaro here he’s trying to get that head control he’s got a hold of that bicep he’s always trying to grab Leon and be real physical with him and it seems that Camaro does have the strength advantage and all the time he’s grabbing him and hold him in these clinched positions and off the break boom there’s the big elbow right here that he lands he’s always looking for those shots if you can’t get the tape down or he can’t dig under hooks he fires stuff over the top so he’s making the fight physical and now we’re starting to get a little bit later in the fight and here we go now Camaro starts to do what Camaro does right he starts to push Leon against the cage and this happens a lot and you could see Camaro here he’s working to get the hands locked right Leon is standing up tall he’s putting all this pressure forward into Leon so Leon has pinned Against the Cage but what Kamara really wants to do is he wants to lock those hands and he wants to load the legs so we’re going to break this down we’re going to watch how he gets these takedowns you can see his hips are way out here right now right and even though he’s got that forward pressure and he’s holding him there he’s still really not in a position to take him down or to pick him up and pull him off the fence but watch what he does here we’re gonna watch Camaro he’s going to take a big deep step with his left leg right here and this is the load here this is when we load the takedown you always want to get this foot in the middle right and you want to get this knee as far as you can as your penetration step and we can see kamaru now is all the way loaded in and now what he’s going to do is he’s got his hands connected now he’s going to lift and let’s watch his legs and it’s just like a squat I mean look look at his hips and everything how low it’s gone now he’s got the the power to lift him up and that’s exactly what he’s going to do lift there’s the load now here’s the lift okay now here’s the thing about Leon Edwards He’s got very long legs so he balances himself very well here and you’re going to watch his feet his foot is still on the ground and this makes Camaro have to make an adjustment and Camaro is going to make this adjustment right here let’s watch this knee in this leg what he’s going to do he’s going to raise that leg and help Elevate Leon to finish this takedown Leon’s foot still on the ground again his base is still there so he ain’t going anywhere let’s keep watching this leg and let’s watch how he elevates Leon here lifting that left leg up and we see it now again it’s off the ground he’s elevated him up and he uses that to finish this takedown Leon tries to post but there it is and we’re gonna watch this over and over again and we’re also going to see in the second fight the adjustments that Leon makes to not get taken down in these positions it was a close fight it was a very competitive fight as the fight wore on Kamara would start to to take control but I think it’s important to look at all these little points here so you look at that Leon shut that takedown down okay now we go to the next series here same situation Camaro makes an adjustment Camaro’s going to throw this spin kick and stop all right he just went for that Single Leg Takedown and it was stuffed he throws that kick Leon backs up and there’s that little Tempo pause and this is where Kamara was just so smart with his fight IQ he has a little Tempo pause now let’s watch what he does as Leon comes back in he goes right for it again this time he enters in on the single he’s already starting to flare for the double and he’s going to run Leon all the way across the cage here and take them down right when he gets them down he likes to start attacking the hands and the wrists and the posts that Leon has so we just see the adjustment here Kamara went for the shot didn’t get it backs up throws a spin kick waits for Leon to walk forward Tempo change hits him again so here’s the little tricks of the trade that Kamar was using in the very first fight in 2015 he had this fight IQ so imagine by 2022 as the champion what his fight IQ was and the same for Leon as they both grown tremendously so here’s where Kamara really starts to kind of break Leon down and here we see this is the last round of the fight and this is kind of what’s happened Camaro just kept pressing against the fence get real physical with him here we see Leon he’s got wrist control and this is an important thing we’re going to see this theme throughout in the next the next bout as well this is the right thing to do he’s got wrist control he’s trying to Jack him up but we’re gonna see Leon’s mistake here and kind of his you know his immaturity at this point as a fighter he goes for a guillotine here which is not something that you want to do unless you’ve got that thing all the way locked up and once you once you lock that Guillotine up you’re going to have to pull guard and you’re going to have to be able to hold that person in that position and stretch them out to get that torque to finish the choke so right away you understand Kamara understands all that Camaro understands all that so right away Camaro gets just gets deeper doubles down on his takedown right he’s gonna lift this again with that load let’s watch his legs he’s going to lift and load right here there’s the load and he’s gonna pull his hands are connected but what he’s going to do is he’s going to go right to side control and he’s going to control Leon’s legs and by controlling Leon’s legs and going to side control there’s absolutely no chance of him getting choked and you’ll see right here he’s got Leon’s legs Leon’s can’t get to guard from here so now this is actually just keeping him stuck now he’s just holding kamaru close to him and keeping himself in side control and you can even get a Von flu choke from here if somebody holds on to the guillotine in space and you’re inside control so this is a mistake from Leon and this is you know I don’t want to call it his immaturity it was a great fighter he was in the UFC but these are the small details that matter and the devil’s in the details and that’s how Kamara would get that takedown and this this would prove big in this fight because as we’re going to see now Camaro just goes to work here in this third round and and what he’s doing is he’s controlling Leon’s opposite wrist and we see this all the time fight he’s got a hold of Leon’s wrist he can’t post he can’t get up and Kamara will hold on to that wrist and just go to work and he does I mean he he pounds on Leon here for this whole round and this is kind of what people remember from this fight they don’t remember the competitive first and second round Camaro wins unanimous decision and moves on with his career and of course Leon Edwards earned his rematch and then some seven years later nearly until he got the title shot against Kamara Usman again to try to exact revenge and what a fight it was I mean it’s unbelievable Brennan this whole story is unbelievable and in the time that Leon is climbing up the division and winning and winning and winning Kamar Usman becomes a welterweight great and the talks of being as good as GSP trying to tie Anderson Silva’s record for the most consecutive wins this was a huge fight when these guys met last and there was so much at stake and Kamara was really favored to win and as we see he controlled a lot of the fight so it was really high drama until the end so let’s take a peek here get into it so Leon completely rebuilds himself he’s ready for the moment Camaro now a seasoned Champion but let’s let’s take a look round one there’s the cut off again with the feet there’s that little fainting we just got to talk about this I mean Usman gets Leon to react to whatever he’s doing and and and Leon takes a backstep right away I mean it kind of goes all the way back to the last fight when Leon is backing up against the fans and letting Camaro kind of bully him around and this is the theme here that um that Usman tries to do to Leon every time that they meet in every situation and I think the physicality is going to play a big role here so we see Usman trying to track him here and we see Leon he’s kind of waiting we’re going to take a look at this Usman sees that he’s waiting in front so he fires this little kick and give him something to think about he knows that Leon is waiting to counter he knows Leon’s got eyes on him and he’s waiting so he throws this little kick to keep him busy after he throws the kick he comes back he’s always watching Leon let’s watch what Camaro does here he’s very good at Tempo changing here he’s going to wait and he uses this jab over and over and over again and we need to talk about this Camaro Usman 76 inch reach very long for the welterweight class Leon Edwards even though being taller than him only has a 74 inch reach so Camaro has a two inch reach advantage and he utilizes it over and over again he gets that little Sprint step gets something in his face and then right after that you can guess what he’s going to do he gets right in on the legs so kamaru Usman same story right but Leon Edwards has made some big improvements and we’re going to see that here this goes all the way back to the first fight when he gets him in the same spot and we’re gonna break this down here he’s going to go for the same kind of takedown here he’s going to get in there he’s going to try to lift and hike again we go back to talking about Leon’s got that leg posted still on the ground because he’s so tall Camaro’s trying to drive him over trying to hike him up but Leon has made those improvements in seven years he posts his hand and he’s back up and he’s in the fight and this is so important he’s gotten way better at digging under hooks right and this is what you want to do when you’re against the fence you want to dig under Hooks and you want to turn the basics are what when and this is the most important thing in takedown defense is the underhook so Leon just gets Right to Work stops that first take down of Camaro and shows an improvement in his strength as well I feel like turning Camaro here and kind of giving him a hard time now here goes Leon he’s starting to wrestle that didn’t work out too well he tomorrow’s starting to go to work again we’ve seen this theme before but again this is a different Leon Edwards this isn’t the same Leon Edwards from 2015. Leon Edwards now black belt Jiu Jitsu and we’re going to watch what he does here he’s got one foot on the hip which is what you want to do to try to create space and separation so that way he can’t tomorrow can’t pressure in with his hips but this is the other thing I want to watch he’s constantly controlling that arm right and he’s going to control that arm for a reason he’s also controlling the posture and trying to control the head so this is very good guard work from Leon and he’s going to use this position to try to sweep and we’re going to see this right coming up here watch what Leon does watch his left knee all right this is called a knee Shield right here he’s got his shin all the way across right now Camaro’s belly all right now I want to watch this leg and what it’s going to do this leg is going to come straight down to the mat and it’s going to try to cut this leg of of Camaro the base while this knee Shield elevates him so we call this a scissor sweep he’s going to elevate him and cut him he also has to control his head so that way he can hold on to him while he does this so Leon is going to hit this sweep and he’s going to get a nice little scramble here right there he elevates Kamara with the sweep we can see that Camaro’s up in the air we see the leg that he cut him with we see him trying to create that space of scramble but Camaro has such a good base he doesn’t go all the way over he comes back down but Leon uses that to get up and this is super impressive here and it shows the strength of Leon Edwards here right and it just shows how tuned in he is he’s got his hands on the mat he knows his position he knows where he is it really kind of alludes to the fact that he’s improved so much that he could use his Jiu Jitsu to create that separation and get up and right away not even fully sweeping him he’s still up he’s still posted up so Leon’s gonna get to the fence and right when he gets to the fence we’re going to see this over and over again from Leon these guys are going to have such a risk battle in these clinched positions and there’s so many things that happen here when you let someone control your hands so I want to pay attention to that and it’s going to be a theme so he’s he’s gonna peel kamaru’s hands off of him and that’s what he needs to do and he also needs to turn and face so you never want to have your back to your opponent in any situation inside the octagon it’s never going to be good right whether you’re against the fence whether you’re on the ground you’ve got to turn in face so we’re going to see Leon here he’s going to work to turn in face he stays on that wrist he’s going to bring this he’s got to bring this arm all the way over Camaro’s head right he’s got to come all the way around and we’re gonna see him do this which is the right thing to do it’s never easy so now he’s all the way back around right well while he’s doing that Camaro sees an opportunity to try to trip the leg right and I think again this goes back to the physicality of kamaru how strong he is everybody knows how strong he is how strong of a wrestler he is but Leon has also gotten a lot stronger he obviously has been working on his physique and on his physical strength because these positions that he failed at in the first fight he was able to sustain himself in this fight a lot more so we’re going to see Leon he stays up that trip doesn’t work and now here’s a very critical piece now you see Leon has the underhook on this side he’s got a wizard right here on this side okay so as this goes on Camaro’s thing all right he’s got head position Camaro’s not in a bad spot he’s got his head lower Camaro has dominated Leon up to this point in grappling nobody has ever taken Kamara Usman down in his UFC career zero takedowns Colby had that little moment where he kind of touched down but it didn’t count officially and for a national champion wrestler trust me it matters so that’s what makes this unbelievable so as we watch Leon he’s going to hike that under hook up and now he’s going to go to this position get a little butterfly grip but kamaru still has this underhook on this side and if I have one underhook I feel pretty good so Camaro’s in a decent position he’s got one under hook we know Leon has this underhook and has gotten that grip so they’re kind of one for one Leon does have the grip connected but Camaro feels he feels all right here Leon’s gonna step through right here now before we see what happens here I want to talk about Camaro’s mindset let’s watch this hand if I feel like I’m in a lot of danger I’m attacking what’s attacking me with my hands if I feel like I’m not in danger I can throw a little body shots and do a little stuff like that because I feel like I have time I’m not in a bad spot watch what he does with this little right hand he’s going to throw this little just this little baby punch and at the same time he’s throwing that baby punch let’s watch what Leon does Leon is going to take that leg and he is going to outside trip Kamar Usman right even in this moment now you could you could tell Camaro’s like oh man wait a minute something might happen but when you watch what happens and how it happens tomorrow still has the underhook and let’s let’s let’s watch this in slow motion pretty incredible as Leon pulls his leg out and some miraculous fashion Kamara Usman keeps both of his feet completely planted this is the ultimate limbo right here I mean I I it’s incredible his balance and if you look at him and you look at his face he is looking this way and the reason he’s looking this way is because he takes this underhook and he’s trying to throw over throw by Leon here and explode while maintaining his base and he almost does it here he almost does let’s watch Leon Edwards here let’s freeze it right there so you can see Leon is head first right here Camaro is now his legs are he’s this one’s still making contact he’s used that one to try to explode over but Leon just enough strength to stay on top and this is big right here there’s the first takedown ever against Kamara Usman one of the best Welch weights in the history of the UFC Leon knows that Camaro is going to explode so let’s watch how he prepares for this and and guys with long legs do this a lot and he does it very very well here we’re gonna watch Leon’s ankles here he’s gonna cross his ankles underneath and he’s going to create a little bit of a lock here let’s get a good picture of it right there so what he does is he crosses his ankles underneath Camaro’s body so Camaro’s actually not even on the ground now Kamari was resting on top of Leon’s calves so when Camaro tries to explode and move around he’s not based on the ground right he doesn’t he doesn’t have a base he’s kind of just moving around under Leon’s legs this is exactly what Leon wants so you’re going to watch his Camaro explodes here Leon’s going to keep that lock and that pressure with his hamstrings Camaro is trying to fight him off he’s trying to explode he’s pushing on the hips right here but that lock stays and again there it is and so now he’s got Camaro kind of turning sideways but again he’s still underneath his calf and that’s what you want that’s how you keep somebody down and if he flips over you look for the hooks so let’s watch Leon’s groundwork here and you know he didn’t look like a black belt in 2015 but he looks like a black belt here Leon is binding his time but we’re going to see what Leon is doing Leon is actually working on the wrist control and here it is right here so again we keep talking about it wrist wrist wrist wrist Leon’s got a seat belt and wrist control and now what he’s going to do and again he maintains the ankles underneath and now Leon is just going to pull him back on top of him and get proper back control and let’s go back to this right here this is so key again it’s grabbing the wrists so as Leon has the seat belt and connects his hands together here he also has that wrist of kamaru right he’s reached around one is underneath and one is over the top but he’s grabbing his wrist so as he pulls him back he also has a wrist as well we’re gonna these guys are about to have an epic wrist battle right here is about to happen so Camaro understands the position he sees what’s happened but also we see Leon is looking for that body triangle he’s already got that foot there and Camaro knows that so he has raised that knee up to try to block that side and not allow that lock to happen once Leon gets his foot behind his knee that’s going to be a problem from Camaro and he knows that so let’s watch what happens here between these two so Camaro’s trying to block the hook and so he’s going to take his hand and here he is but when you’re defending a choke you always want to be two on one you know that two on one well if I’m blocking the hook with one hand I can’t beat two on one and Leon knows that so this battle ensues between these two and it really impressed me how Leon understood exactly what to do to counter what Kamara was doing so again there’s the hand we see Leon he’s staying on the wrist here right as Camaro tries to block that hook out he attacks the neck look at how slick this is Leon goes all right he’s busy now now’s my time he tries to get the choking hand deep attack the neck we like to grab the shoulder I always tell him if you get that hand deep grab that shoulder so you can keep it and then now look he’s got wrist control on the one hand so now he’s controlling one of the arms while trying to choke with the other one while kamara’s got the other hand defending the hook so all these things are happening and these guys are making all these adjustments right within milliseconds to counter each other and kamaru understands he’s a black belt as well from Jorge Santiago he’s well versed he understands what he needs to do but again you can still see he’s still worried about that lock happening and he’s also paying attention to what Leon’s doing controlling his wrist but now none of that matters now now the lock is there so now Leon has got control he’s got long legs and he’s got that body triangle and Camaro and Camaro is not going anywhere he’s also got this wrist control here and he’s got this right here we have never ever seen Kamara Usman on his back let alone seen him with somebody with a full body triangle locked on him attacking his arrest and attacking his neck so Leon does a great job here of controlling kamaru so you see him he’s attacking the choke Camaro knows he’s got to go two on one he covers that wrist now we see it again now they go back to the risk battle but again we want two on one so he wants to go two on one this hand and try to get on the other side of his head you can’t choke somebody with one arm right well there’s a couple people that can but it’s not easy to do especially from the rear naked position because you can’t get enough Force right you can’t get enough pressure so Camaro knows if I can control one of his arms I should be all right but he has to also turn his hip into the body lock to put pressure on that lock you sit out towards the body lock and it creates pressure on the ankles Leon is in a position right here where he has very slickly stuck his foot in kamaru’s knee right there not letting Camaro turn around so this is a position that Leon gets a lot and you can tell so we watch this battle unfold here tomorrow’s got to be patient here and he is and you see the two on one continues and it’s it’s really going to keep on going where they’re just fighting for this now we see Leon looks like he’s getting somewhere he’s got some pressure here and he’s finally got a little bit of a connection right he’s got a little bit of a connection but Camaro’s got his hand in there and it’s not under the chin you could see Camaro’s kind of his lips so it’s not quite under the chin but he’s gotten himself where he can connect his hands this is going to go on and on tomorrow’s going to peel this but Camaro is not in a position to get up he’s not because of this body triangle and he realizes that that’s why he doesn’t really freak out finally now you see the two on one right here and this is what Kamara wanted the whole time you want a two on one and he’s gonna take this arm he’s gonna start working it to the other side of his head that’s what you’re looking for but the round is gonna end in in this position and this is the start of the second round so Camaro now goes to the corner knowing he lost that round yeah Leon won that round Leon had gotten a body trial he got back control obviously the most dominant thing that happened he got control time so Camaro comes out knowing I just lost a round of Leon Edwards so you think that Leon Edwards would build some confidence from that but I guess old habits die hard because he backs up against the fence and beginning around two and before I even played you can see him he’s got his hands covered and he’s being very reactive right away and it seems that Camaro just understands that he can be very physical and kind of bully Leon around and he goes right to work punch punch I mean just look just look at Leon’s posture and position just covering up and against the fence the worst possible position for him so Camaro comes out guns blazing right in his face round two going right back to his old tricks of the feigning and the faking keeping Leon guessing what what are you doing and you can see Leon is being very reactive he’s always watching kamaru tomorrow’s always kind of leading the dance here so I was looking for Leon to come out confident in round two but uh for some reason he kind of reverted back so Camaro just goes right back to work he gets that little faint that little level change and let’s watch Leon’s hands here so just off the faint and the level change eyes closed hands up you know just from the faint and it just shows a reactive mindset that’s going on and which is it’s a key point because there’s a crazy awesome turning point in this story so but this is early in the story and we see Leon he’s even after having success he’s very reactive and Camaro obviously knows that too Camaro’s watching him the whole time Camara was very a high fight IQ always paying attention to see what kind of reactions he can get from his opponents making the necessary adjustments then to win bam there’s that jab Kamara Usman has developed an incredible jab that he times so well he uses it again if I punch you in the face you can’t React to what I’m going to do to your legs back him against kids just throwing more and more power shots whenever he gets them backed up and here we go we see him in the middle there’s the faint again now let’s talk about this this seems like a very small thing Leon just landed a left hand but I want to go ahead and unpack this and look at it from the top so you watch Leon here he’s in an orthodox dance okay he’s got his right leg back you got Kamara in his Orthodox dance tomorrow’s going to come forward with that jab he’s going to touch Leon but Leon’s going to make an adjustment here as he backs up let’s watch what he does with his legs he’s going to switch to Southpaw and this is a critical piece here because now daddy southpaw kamaru should want to stay outside of the leg but again as I stated earlier tomorrow makes this mistake a few times where he will drift into the power side right now that Leon has switched to Southpaw these are the things that he needs to worry about but kamaru obviously knows what he’s doing but he did that a few times and he got away with it he was very successful but this is something that we’re going to see Leon understand and have success with Leon is now Southpaw Leon’s going to throw a punch right here all right now let’s stop it as Leon throws that punch we see again Camaro’s head drift this way this is not where you want to go because again this is the power side power leg power hand so Leon got outside of his foot right as Camaro drifted towards the power side and corralled him towards his power side and that’s why this is so important because this is a fundamental mistake here by kamaru and he’s going to pay for it he’s going to get hit with that left hand and you can see again he is literally right in front of all the danger you can see Leon’s got that nice angle Leon’s head is way out here right where you want to be in a safe Zone this is exactly how you want to fight somebody in stand up so Leon has some success whenever Camaro drifts to his power side and kamaru got away with it a few times but you see it here it’s a clean shot you don’t want to lean into the power side they go back and forth again we’ve got to talk about how kamaru gets Leon to react to everything he does here Camaro goes and hits him with a faint with that level change and you would think with this level change in this position this looks like I’m trying to wrestle here right this doesn’t look like I’m trying to punch but man he’s just got Leon just covering up a lot and he’s doing a lot of reacting here so Camaro sees that he could have shot a shot there he comes back up and he’s got eyes on Leon here right he’s looking at Leon he’s locked into Leon and seeing what Leon’s reaction is Leon still got his hands covered but Leon is going to open his eyes up right here here we go now he’s back so we’re gonna see the timing of these two and how much they’ve evolved right here this is a cool scenario because they both make a good read we’re going to watch kamaru again on the tempo change he gets that little level change going again and as he level changes you see the hands are coming up is it a takedown this time Kamar goes straight down the pipe lands a perfect right hand right to the chin so that shows you Kamara with a level change get a reaction level change jab level change go to reaction level change now straight right hand split it right down the middle look at where the leg is doing everything right here we’re right where we’re supposed to be but Leon you can see him kind of trying to grab for the head so Leon had already made a decision he’s like I’m throwing this knee and here it comes he throws a knee right as Camaro comes in he doesn’t really hit him too cleanly but he does back tomorrow off but it shows you he’s starting to figure out the timing of that he was he was like all right he’s going to come in he throws the knee and these two are starting to understand each other and this kind of shows you they’re starting to know each other’s tricks a little so again backing him up all the way to the fence with a jab now here we see Leon backed up against the cage and here goes kamaru just straight up grabbing his head come here come here I got something for you what do I got for you a right hand what else do I got for you a right elbow and Leon is just takes way too many shots here against Kamara I don’t know why he keeps backing up against the fence huge elbow and Leon never does well in those positions and I look for his coaches to be all over that going into the next fight well something Leon Edwards said was a factor the elevation of Salt Lake City which doesn’t deal with in London but that would make sense after a first round where he expended a lot of energy second third fourth round he said that was a factor where Usman trains in Denver where did the first fight take place Brandon first fight was in Orlando Florida isn’t that sea level yes it is I rest my case so moving forward Camaro just seems to have that pressure and look some guys get pressured I mean it is what it is I mean it’s Kamar Usman one of the greatest fighters of Our Generation right so I mean I get it um and now Leon’s got the straps so it doesn’t really matter uh now but you can see again here’s that black line and whenever you’ve got a Striker versus a Grappler you always tell them do not back up past this line why because the cage comes into play and we know Kamara loves to use the cage he loves to back people up he loves to get him against the fence but again we see Leon constantly backing up and he’s going to do it again and Camaro just pressures them forward here and he’s just gonna unload on them big shots and there’s Edwards with the guard again and just going to work you just don’t want to fight with your back against the fence like that so let’s take a look at this too this goes back to the footwork that Camaro does so well here he’s always going to where Leon is trying to escape to and we he cuts off the Octagon so well so we know Leon is like all right I gotta get out of here I don’t want to stay here as Leon starts to go this way kamaru is going to cut him off right here and get to where he’s going and we see that and he’s going to throw this left hook now this punch isn’t meant to land it’s just meant to Corral right and again we see Leon shells up and he Corrals them and that’s exactly what he wants keeps his back against the fence head control and then level changes again we know Camaro putting all that pressure in to Leon forward against the fence but what he’s really looking for is to lock these hands here get under his butt and take him for a ride and that’s exactly what he’s going to do he’s going to lock his hands and lift put Leon down and immediately start going to work Leon tries to regard here so now now we’re moving in around three well round two was a huge departure from round one Usman won round two fairly easily I thought and and the the the the more important piece here Brennan is that the fight is moving again to how the first fight went takedowns Ground Control pressure backing You Up Against the Cage you know just kind of bullying Leon around so now we’re in round three and it’s one to one so man we got to take a look at this let’s break this down Brendan this is again going to kind of talk about the reactiveness of Leon Edwards um here they’re playing the range game and what happens is I touch I see where you’re at I get a feel I know if I’m longer than you where I what I can do from this position and also in wrestling we always say if I can touch you I can take you down I don’t want to shoot a shot from out here right it’s too far away I want to be able to get hands on you so that way I know where my distance is and I can manage it correctly well this is exactly what Kamar is doing here he’s he’s managing distance and he’s measuring distance and what he’s going to do is he’s going to use that little measurement here and Leon’s going to stick his hand out again Camaro’s going to stick his hand out again and Kamara goes oh there’s your hand i’m gonna go right underneath you and this just shows you how Camaro at this point in the fight is a step ahead he’s already down on the leg Leon’s still up here right so we know full extension too with his hand not not trying to pull up we know that kamaru is just a step ahead right now going into the third round Camaro gets in on the legs and we’re gonna see Camaro pull the leg forward close to him and then come in on this double and I want you to watch the head you always want to get the head up here so you don’t get stuck in weird spots you’re going to see Camaro’s head start coming up as he drives to the fence there are the eyes just good wrestling driving Leon to the fence you can see Leon trying to wedge that right arm in there but these are deep deep shots and when you’re reactive and when you’re waiting and when you’re not being proactive against a guy like this this is what’s going to happen again now once I get locked under the butt like that I can just pull you away from the fence right I don’t want to try to lift you up I want to pull you away like kind of like taking a chair and just pulling it out that’s what I’m trying to do because it’s a lot less energy and it’s much more efficient so he’s got that lock but I want to watch how he does this there’s the load that we talked about the step and the load now he’s got the load he’s got the lock he’s going to pull him away but I want to talk about what he does here now what you want to do is you want to take your opponent’s legs and you want to put them up high and you want to pull him away from the fence and stack him so that way his hips aren’t active everything in Jiu Jitsu is hips well if my hips can’t move and I’m like this on the ground I can’t defend and when you’re stacked like that that’s when you get hit big and you can’t use your feet to defend and that’s exactly what Camaro is going to do this stacking right here this stacked position is exactly what you want for ground and pound because you can see now we’re head over head which is very important we want to be head over head when we punch down so we can drive all that Force down I don’t want to be punching at you like this from the guard right this is going to have no power I need to get my posture in I need to get my knees in I need to stack you so that way I can get power in on those shots and that’s a very dominating position here not when you want to be in and Leon isn’t even in a position to post and get up so again tomorrow just being real physical here in in the third round backing him up Landing big punches Big Shots there’s another big elbow and then right in on the legs again he’s giving him the lock right pull down now we see that post but again we talk about this theme over and over again right he’s attacking his post he knows that Leon wants to post so he’s going to attack that wrist attacking the wrist now let’s watch this this is so slick here and it’s a little detail that if you don’t pay attention to it you won’t see it Camaro is holding on to his foot with one hand and his wrist with the other well if you’ve got my wrist and you got my foot how am I going to get up and so he keeps a hold of this foot and while keeping hold of the foot he’s going to advance his hook with his left leg so he’s still got the foot you can clearly see it there’s the foot there’s the wrist so Leon cannot base and as Leon is kind of trying to turn into him as you see that which is the right thing but when someone’s holding your foot and your wrist now watch kamaru as he takes this leg right here and he gets the hook which he will get he will let go of the foot and get that control position so this just shows you I mean still got the foot doesn’t let go doesn’t let go doesn’t let go still has the foot lets go the foot sets in the hook so kamaru is always controlling not only the arms but he’s also controlling the feet and these are the type of things that really break somebody down and uh so now he’s got wrist control he has that hook on the inside he’s going to take that foot we’ll watch that foot and now he’s going to start riding that foot and hooking that leg a little bit there it is so he hooks his foot here similar to how Leon was using his leg and that body triangle now he’s got wrist control here and he’s putting all that weight look how close he is like a backpack on Leon he’s got all his weight on him right this is a bad spot for Leon um and it’s one of those things where Camaro’s not using any energy and Leon’s using all of his energy which is what you want when you’re trying to to Grapple uh you want your opponent to feel your weight and Leon’s just in a bad spot right here and those scrambles that Leon lets happen where he doesn’t fight out ends stuff into these positions which which these rounds all went to Camaro from this Ground Control and and backing up against the fence so those moments that that Leon needed to really scramble in the second and the third um he didn’t and and Kamar was going to control him ride this out obviously Kamar had lost the first round he’s got to put some rounds in the bank so just smart grappling here now we’re entering round four Usman got that round in the bank so he’s won the second round he’s won the third round again looks pretty similar to the first fight I think he you know he’s kind of well into control at this point so it’s two to one we’re going into the fourth round here they are in the middle you’re gonna see him right in front of each other and Camaro’s gonna slip that punch from Leon and land that jab right and and just to think of kamaru Usman you know against a dangerous Striker like Leon Edwards in the fourth round of the title fight to be so confident just be slipping and and land in shots it shows you where his mindset was which again is going to be important um and how confident he was just how confident he was at this time in this fight uh and in all areas he’s just standing there he doesn’t look panicked he doesn’t look like he’s trying to rush takedowns he’s going to land this jab and then we’re gonna watch Leon big swing here look at that he brings this thing way down here and you could see a little bit of desperation starting to come out of Leon now as we get in the fourth round you can kind of see the dejection on his face his his body language was not very positive and we see Leon he’s going to throw this big punch and Leon is a very precise Striker so and I mean Usman just out of there you know so as we enter the fourth round we’ve got a confident Usman and a little bit of a desperate Leon now this is an important piece right here because we see the foot battle right now we’ve got kamaru it’s just a little outside the foot but whenever kamaru makes the mistake of drifting towards the power side we see Leon make these adjustments and we see a little faint here from Leon and we see Camaro just kind of standing in front and now you can see he’s just drifted just a little bit more in front the the legs are about even but there’s just a little bit of a change in the foot position and Leon sees that and whenever he sees Camaro in the front of him in the middle of that power side he makes really good adjustments he’s gonna kick that body with that front kick and whenever he has a chance when Camaro stays right in front of him and he goes first he lands he really does and I think that’s a key point for Leon to do well in this fight he’s got to go first he’s got to go first he’s got to make kamaro be reactive and you know beautiful front kick confident um he’s got great striking and he hits Kamar with it just wasn’t a lot he just didn’t throw first a lot so he hits Kamar with that important Point whenever he gets in front he’s successful he gets him on the fence here and let’s talk about this a little bit we see Camaro he’s going to do the little you know the little whatever with his hands here and kinda but Leon is trying to change the tide so he gives them a little whatever you’re not very strong and we’re gonna see what happens here Usman looks like he’s taking a break or I don’t know what he’s doing but he’s waiting he’s going to fight the hands he’s going to break free right after he breaks free you could kind of see the annoyance he had on his face right he kind of looked annoyed more than anything he’s like oh you want to grab me all right I’m gonna put you against the fence back you up Camaro pushes him against the cage here we see him connect his hands again there’s that connection right there we see Leon standing very tall and we’re gonna watch Camaro here as he lifts and loads and this is the best one that he’s done we talked about it earlier about wanting to get that penetration step very deep his foot is on the fence that’s how deep of a step he’s taken that’s going to allow him to get even more of a lift and really explode into this takedown and let’s watch his takedown and watch what he does with Leon boom right he takes Leon down so much he almost makes Leon go over and this is again that explosion and we talk about the legs getting the legs up now his hips are what he can’t shrimp he can’t regard he can’t do anything his hips aren’t even on the ground so Camaro in the fourth round showing the physicality oh you’re gonna hold me against the case get off me right I’m going to back you up I’m going to flare you take you down get your legs over your head this is my world so Camaro’s still dominating this fight in the fourth round with the grappling and that’s the end of the fourth round okay now I really need to talk about this as we enter the fifth round and I have to recognize from coach to coach I’ve got to recognize Leon Edwards as coach David Lavelle this cornering right here to me is really one of the biggest points in this fight and what his coach does right here and and how he changes the directory of this fight he deserves a lot of praise and he did get a lot of attention and interviews and all that I saw him on Arrow hawani and all that and he deserves it because he knew his guy so well in this moment he knew exactly what he needed to say to him it wasn’t pleasant and it wasn’t fun and I mean he even pokes him a little bit and prods him a little bit because here he is coach Lavelle going into this last round having the flashbacks of going into the last round in the first fight and what happens and we see him here but you can see Leon and he got that little bit of spark that he needed that little bit of spark and I’m going to tell you coach to coach it takes a lot of energy right but that tells me that he cares and this is what I think he had in his head this is the first fight and we put this in here just so you could see this is Leon against the fence you know third round had been a long fight he’s on the wrist and we talked about this earlier and he goes to the guillotine he gets taken down and this is kind of the fight he ends up getting Turtle he ends up getting dominated and that’s it and the fight looks like to be fair that it’s going this way again into the fifth round but coach Lavelle didn’t want that for his people so he stepped in and gave him that talk now here we go fifth round same spot looks for a little switch here’s the takedown stop this time for whatever reason Leon Edwards I’m not going to stay down this time and you can see this his whole butt and everything is not on the ground because of this one post right that one post and this one scramble is huge in the history of mixed martial arts this one scramble and we always say as a coach you never know what scramble what moment is going to win you the fight and this little moment right here is so big Leon’s not going down no not today he gets back up on his feet starts playing wrist game this is good defense here he’s whizzering here stops that take down he’s not done yet so we see Leon Edwards on his feet now we see Leon Edwards moving forward a little bit and this is what I was waiting for you know as I stated earlier whenever he goes forward he has a lot of success and he should go forward more so he starts going forward and we see kamaru drifting to the power side again he’s walking into the power side and Leon sees that he’s locked in so again as I said earlier when Leon sees him in front of the power side he gives them something to remember front kick this time it’s the front kick but watch what Leon does here he sees that front kick but he switches his stance like he did earlier and he changes to Orthodox as he comes back now when he does this he’s gonna also drift this way outside of the power leg which is the exact position he would want to be in Orthodox very slick how he does this he’s going to fade off as Camaro comes forward and misses the jab and now he’s in a good space for what he’s about to do one two so Leon has this tricks that he uses with his footwork that allow him to land strikes in good positions when Camaro’s in transition and this is important this is an important piece for Leon going into the next fight I look for him to switch his footwork up a lot and create a lot more of these situations that he can win lands the right hand clock is ticking fights almost over and Leon is starting to come alive he’s starting to throw offense it’s not over yet Beyonce and faking we see Usman drifting a little bit into the power side he faints the Jab shot heard around the world there’s really nothing else to say I’m gonna let it play I’m just gonna let it play this was one of the biggest upsets and the way it happened I mean the drama the way it unfolded Camaro’s so close to history so close to memorializing his career for him to land this kick the way that he did I mean this is why people love MMA it really truly isn’t let’s break this down and and see what really happens here and try to understand what it was and you know people say Leon got lucky Leon did not get lucky and that that’s what I tried to show in this breakdown is that Leon understood whenever Kamara went to that side he throws left kicks he threw that left hand around the guard he knows that’s not where Camaro is supposed to be and every time Kamara went there what he took advantage of it and when we look at this again we see kamaru drifting into the power side and Leon understands that you’re going to see Leon use his hands here to kind of put him in front of kamaru right well you always say set your kicks up with punches right put something in front of the other guy to make them worry about it even if it’s just a hand or a fist or whatever to make them pay attention to that if I’m doing something up here I can kick your legs down here well Leon does that perfectly right here he’s going to put hands in the face of kamaru first he just kind of throws that right hand out but let’s look at that this is the key point right here Brendan is he takes his left hand and puts it right in front of Camaro’s face so when he’s here he’s doing this right exactly he does this and when he does this you see kamaru drift to get out of the way and he does not see the kick coming the kick is already on the way and it’s not like the first kick that we showed in the first fight this is shin right here and you can tell it’s Shin because you can see the whole foot there ain’t no foot involved in that and that’s bone Naja right there and and that’s all she wrote it doesn’t get more devastating than that so Camaro going into the power side Leon at the very last minute catches the hell Mary new welterweight champion of the world all right an extensive breakdown of both of their fights they spent 39 minutes inside the Octagon together so they obviously know each other very well let’s go to keys to Victory as Leon Edwards looks to hold on to that belt what does he need to do well Brandon he’s got to move forward and he’s got to use his footwork I mean I I talked about this at length he’s backing up a lot he’s being reactive instead of being proactive he’s got to be proactive in this Trilogy you know Camaro is going to make adjustments he’s got to go forward he’s got to give Camaro a different look with that footwork with the Orthodox and with the Southpaw keep confusing and keep making them guess wrong which he did in the last fight it’s a very important piece for Leon to go forward next he has to stay off the fence he cannot allow Kamara to push him back against the cage get easy access to his hips lock his hands and get those takedowns get all that control time and rack it up and get behind again in a five round fight he’s got to make sure he circles off the cage and Frames away we’ve seen him do it successfully we know he can do it he just has to do it every time Kamara starts backing him up stay away from that black line and try to keep Camaro in the middle lastly he’s got to win the scrambles Brendan if he wouldn’t have won that last scramble in the fifth round by posting that hand and getting up he wouldn’t be the welterweight champion so I think that we see a mature Leon Edwards who can win in All Phases when he’s aggressive and goes forward and I’m used to seeing him do that against a lot of Fighters but not as much against Camaro so I just can’t wait to see you know him now as the champion what kind of attitude and what kind of game plan he brings to this fight we scroll over to kamaru Usman now who is still the betting favorite in this matchup what are his keys to get the belt back absolutely Brandon Camaro Usman needs to keep using the jab we saw him have a great success with the jab his whole offense starts with the jab it’s the Cornerstone of everything he does he uses to cover distance he uses to back him up land his power shot with his right hand or access the hips with wrestling getting him to be defensive with the faints and The Fakes got to keep using the jab with that he’s got to utilize the wrestling he uses the jab to get to the wrestling right he’s had so much success in this 39 minutes against Leon Edwards yes Leon did get the takedown but Camaro has won the bulk of the grappling and appears to be the stronger more physical guy out of the two and Leon has gotten stronger but I don’t know if he’s gotten stronger than kamaru since their previous meeting and lastly he has to push the pace it seems that Camaro puts Leon on his back foot makes him a little bit uncomfortable with his Pace right and every time Leon starts a surge up Camaro just UPS the pace more and more traps him with his footwork Cuts him off faints and fakes and really kind of get in the mind space of Leon Edwards just on him all the time and I look for kamaru she do the same thing to push the pace to not sit back when he sat back it was disaster for him so I look for him to really get into Leon’s face and and try to bully him around honestly and try to get that title back well Kamara Usman has a lot to prove in this matchup which is saying something based on the trajectory of what his championship Reign was before Leon Edwards landed that head kick and for Leon Edwards of course he wants to prove that that was no fluke no lucky shot with one minute to go in the fifth round for safe side Brandon Fitzgerald thanks for watching UFC breakdown what a night it should be in London at UFC 286. 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