Adam Borics vs Mads Burnell: An Arms Race of Adaptations

Photo via Bellator MMA

This previous Saturday, Bellator 276 hosted a stellar bout between two of the top-rated featherweights in the world, culminating in a scintillating 25-minute back-and-forth whereupon Adam Borics edged out Mads Burnell to claim his shot at the winner of the upcoming rematch between AJ McKee and Patricio ‘Pitbull’ Freire. Despite some disparity on the scorecards, the bout was high-action and ferociously-contested the whole way through; it was a great display for both fighters to demonstrate their depth and grit.

 I’ll begin this breakdown by admitting that I have not had the luxury of watching either of these two fighters enough prior to this fight to adequately talk their full games or careers (though, as a member of this site, I certainly am an unapologetic consumer of Mads Burnell’s work), but I’ll say, for anyone into the striking phase of MMA, it’s the exact sort of fight that makes fans of both pugilists and intrigue in their career development from here.

*For more content my colleagues have done over Mads Burnell, please listen to Grappling analyst Ben Kohn’s interview with him or his previous work about his ground game.

If there is a key word that describes this fight: adaptions. That is, when confronted when a problem, a fighter will often have to find ways around dealing with it.

From the very beginning of the fight, Mads Burnell introduces a couple of questions: Behind a cross-arm guard, Burnell becomes a dangerous, flexible pocket threat. The rear hand is pinned adjacent or below the forehead to continuously catch shots. The lead hand is held lower, across the midsection, to keep probing the opponent and ready to unload with counters, particularly hooks. The cross-arm guard is actually more defensively applicable than it is offensively, however, because of the arm positioning. When opponents throw, they’ll find their punches, especially their straighter selection, can get picked off and parried. If the body gets targeted, then the lead hand protects those vital areas; moreover, it’s often risky to attack the body of a cross-guard user because you’d have to step in and risk being countered. Fighting someone behind a cross-armed guard, therefore, means you recognize that you’re dealing with a fortified tank. When you consider Burnell’s patented wrestling transitions, then that means standing in front of him for extended periods of time is a terrible idea.

As shown by the master of the cross-arm guard, Archie Moore, Mads Burnell is a definite boxing enthusiastic.

Adam Borics recognized right away two essential components to fighting this sort of opponent. First, how much he controlled the distance was going to maximize his chances of victory. Burnell was obviously going to be better in any phase where they could exchange - Borics needed to stay out of the pocket and maximize his effectiveness in other phases. And if he couldn’t avoid the pocket, then, second, he needed to at least have answers to fight or get out of there.

Borics established his distance early behind his jab to keep himself laterally moving away from Burnell, but his bigger tool was intercepting Burnell on entry with knees. Because the Dane came in crouched over, Borics looked to draw him into knees, which, even if they didn’t land, would force Burnell to have to reset. Alternatively, Borics played with transitions: Since the knee also closed the gap between them, Borics looked for collar ties to establish a clinch off of them.

Once there: He showed he was incredibly dangerous off the break or if Burnell was too passive.

At distance though, Borics discovered quickly that Burnell could close the gap and take away much of his breathing room - mostly by punishing the jab.

Taking lateral steps to the opponent’s right is a good idea in a closed stance matchup (e.g. orthodox vs orthodox) to establish your jab, but it means you are constantly resetting. In mixed martial arts, this can make you susceptible to kicks and punches. Most of Burnell’s success in this fight was to take advantage of Borics resets and footwork.

Primarily, Burnell employed his trademark body work, specifically a left hook to the body off an inside slip. Because Borics was so committed to moving behind his jab, that gave Burnell the timing he needed to keep up a nonstop attritional attack on the Hungarian’s ribs.

Subsequently, if Borics stopped moving, this meant Burnell could look to keep engagements going - drawing reactions and then counterpunching Borics for trying to stand his ground (and hit him if Borics tried to clinch without adding ancillary attacks).

Burnell made sure to shut down the knees too. The lead hand of a cross arm guard is usually employed to protect the body, but it be modified. Instead of keeping the arm lower, Burnell folded his lead arm horizontally as a bit of a “barrier” (you can also refer to this as a cross-face frame). When Borics stepped in with knees, Burnell’s forearm caught the knee and mitigated its impact. If Borics tried to clinch, Burnell used his left hand to establish wrist control - pulling Borics’ arm across to break his posture. Eventually, Borics would be forced to separate.

That said, Borics switched tactics up himself. Recognizing that Burnell had an incredibly defensively active guard and that he didn’t have the footwork to get away from the Dane enough, Borics started standing his ground, but on his own terms.

A cross-arm guard is incredibly difficult to penetrate if its user is proficient, but a cross-arm guard also isn’t often employed in a cage often. Because engagements are extremely necessary, spatial management and ringcutting are essential components for the cross-arm guard to be at its most potent. In a cage, there are less corners to pin the opponent in - meaning more space for them to move. Moreover, a cross arm guard is still an incredibly planted stance; it’s difficult to establish many ranged options and its user will have to consistently follow and reset themselves to keep up the pursuit.

What allowed Borics to fight his way back into the contest and win on the scorecards was that he recognized how he could keep Burnell’s guard preoccupied even if his own cagecraft left a lot to be desired.

Behind a modified high guard, Borics started to catching shots and firing back in combinations to keep Burnell’s guard busy. Throwaway punches, when mixed with power punches, can succeed at throwing off the timing of your opponent and keep you safer in longer exchanges - especially if the opponent is too concerned with defense.

Instead of strictly jabbing while moving, Borics also turned his jab into frames to hold Burnell’s rear hand in place to reposition and to catch shots on his own limbs. To keep Burnell guessing, he started throwing behind short lead right hands after feinting the jab or hook to dull Burnell’s timing.

When Borics started using his strikes and tactics together in transition, he succeeded even more: For instance, he would kick to break Burnell’s stance, force them to frame or handfight, break the handfight and strike off the break.

There is a major asterisk to what Borics did though. Because his own lateral movement alone wasn’t proficient, he had to work at an extremely high pace to keep Burnell off of him - and this still gave his opponent plenty of opportunities.

On Burnell’s part, he started to have some final answers to Borics. He doubled down on attacking in the clinch itself. Consequently, Borics’ attacks there no longer had a safety zone. At distance, he maintained a heavier pursuit.

More dangerous, however, was how Burnell started to pair his lead body hook with an overhand right cross counter. If Borics was too one-dimensional with his shot selection off of his lead hand, then this double threat made it difficult for him to predict Burnell’s choice of attack.

This extended to longer exchanges - if Borics stayed in the pocket for too long, Burnell made him pay throughout the fight.

Finally, in response to Borics’ work off the lead hand to help reposition, Burnell started counter kicking Borics’ lead leg to try and cut down on his movement and nullify the effectiveness of the frame.

At the end of a brilliant twenty-five minutes of one of the best fights of the year thus far, Adam Borics’ hand was raised, yet this is exactly the kind of fight that elevates both contestants. Very few fighters in MMA show the levels of critical thinking and consistent adjustments in a high-octane bout such as this one - and, thereby make a possible rematch so interesting for two men that are still very much in their prime.

Adam Borics’ cagecraft leaves some room for improvement, but he demonstrated his depth and grit with his transitions and awareness for what he could do versus a dangerous opponent. On Mads Burnell’s part, despite some of his more threatening offense coming a bit too late, he continues to have a brilliant inclination for fighting. You would be hard-pressed to find many featherweights in the world who would beat these two without encountering significant resistance.

Ultimately, this was one of the finest bouts you’ll see all year and it’s impossible to not have been impressed by both men - and I’m sure they were just as impressed with one another.