UFC Fight Night 231 Aftermath: Jailton Almeida’s Boring Dominance

If it is possible to look lackluster while putting on an absolute clinic, Jailton Almeida may have done so against Derrick Lewis in the main event of “UFC Sao Paulo.”

Twenty-one minutes of control time seems like complete domination but in reality, Almeida did little with that control. In today’s Aftermath column, we are looking at what Almeida did well against Lewis. We will be analyzing a few of the takedowns in the fight and seeing that Almeida’s wrestling is more than just a high kick to a double-leg.

Almeida: Heavyweight’s Next Big Problem?

Almeida’s performance in Sao Paulo was nothing short of one-sided. From start to finish, “Malhadinho” controlled Lewis on the ground from the mount. Some fighters, say Khabib Nurmagomedov, will get to mount and grind their opponents down with vicious ground-and-pound. For the Lewis fight, Almeida ascribed to the principle of position before submission.

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In “UFC Sao Paulo” Beforemath, we talked about how the 32-year-old likes to throw the teep or push kick, then transition to a takedown. Against Lewis, who is content to let you come in and bang you out, that approach wasn’t as effective. Instead, Almeida had to be careful to take smart shots that were quick and out the way of that brutal uppercut Lewis looks for against grapplers. Once the Galpao da Luta fighter got to the hips, he made sure to pursue the takedown and keep Lewis moving instead of against the fence to avoid any anti-takedown elbows coming his way.

Lewis hoped to find the uppercut all night, which meant that Almeida had to get in on the takedown in different ways. In the figure above, we see (1) Lewis looking to land something, anything while he has the chance on the feet. Almeida sees this coming and hopes to duck under a right hand which (2) does come. (3) As Almeida gets to the legs, he comes up on the double leg takedown that he loves so much. Lewis will fall over as Almeida drives through. Almeida (4) turns the corner and (5) pushes through for the takedown.

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The entire night was a plague of double-leg takedowns for Lewis. They are the one thing that Almeida does best. While he did not get any ground-and-pound going, the thing he did consistently do, for five rounds at that, is get double-leg takedowns. Once on the ground, Almeida found submitting “The Black Beast” was easier said than done. Only Daniel Cormier and Sergey Spivak have had the fortune of doing so. After that, Almeida decided he would control Lewis instead of fishing submission after submission and tiring himself out. Boring? Yes. Effective? Also, yes.

Position over Submission

That was the name of the game for Almeida. When he got to the ground, he did all he could to keep Lewis down. Lewis has a knack for “just getting up.” Almeida never let up on pursuing the takedowns in a similar vein of Mateusz Gamrot.

(1) In the first frame, we can see it is Lewis in the advantageous position. Notice Almeida’s current leg position. He will use his legs to create a sweep opportunity that Lewis doesn’t see coming. (2) Lewis does what is generally right and has the whizzer. Almeida reaps the leg of Lewis to prevent the get-up by briefly going lower on his back. (3) As he gets back to his knees, Lewis looks to roll Almeida back on his back. (4) Almeida is back in a bad spot but keeps the legs of Lewis. (5) Almeida fights back to his knees and Lewis is posted on one hand and a leg with Almeida possessing the leg and the arm trapped in the whizzer.

This is an important part of the sequence. Lewis is posted on two points: the hand and the leg. Jailton Almeida took the other leg out of the game by sitting on it and knew Lewis would not want to give up his whizzer as he was on his knees. What Almeida does next is take away one of Lewis’ posts which gives him the opportunity to drive through to the better position.

Circling back (5) Almeida punches Lewis in the face. This was nothing powerful nor did it cause damage to Lewis. It didn’t score anything. Its sole purpose was to get Lewis to react, which he did. Lewis lifts his hand up to return the favor. Remember, one of Lewis’ legs is being sat on by Almeida, one hand is caught in the whizzer, and now his posted hand is up and punching. This means Derrick Lewis is only on one post which Almeida picks up. (6) As Lewis punches, Almeida locks up the body and pushes his head into his chest. He will bring his legs backwards to bake the other knee out of play and (7) complete the takedown.

While I have been critical of Almeida a decent amount, he was smooth on the ground, and as the saying goes: If you speak for the wolf, speak against him as well. The way Almeida fought last weekend was not enjoyable. His lack of activity really brought forth many questions about his abilities once he gets to the ground. What would a fighter like Curtis Blaydes, his original opponent, do? Blaydes can stop the takedown and would be good on the feet with his jab. Can Almeida make do in those situations? That question remains to be seen.

Jailton Almeida may not have made many fans at “UFC Sao Paulo” but that was not truly his main objective going into a fight. He is there to win, first and foremost. Would the UFC like him to be heavyweight Khabib? Absolutely. But the fact is that Almeida did what he had to do to get a win to continue his career and earn double the pay. He wants to be champion and the next step in front of him was getting out of the cage with the division’s heaviest hitter with a win was what got him closer to that goal.