Fighter Profile: Michael Chandler

Note: This article was originally created as a film study, but we have decided not to publish it publicly as Bellator is very liberal with their copyright strikes. The full 21-minute long video can be found on our Patreon here.

It’s common for big punchers in combat sports to fall in love with their power and neglect the setups that let them deliver it in the first place. Michael Chandler is a self-aware puncher who’s built a coherent style based on his power. Chandler’s aim is to maximize the impact of power punches in short bursts. 

His style lends itself to short burst offense and makes exchanges more difficult. He fights out of a wide, bladed stance, which is useful for efficient linear movement and quickly sitting down on punches, but limits lateral movement and ability to adjust in exchanges.

Chandler’s bladed stance allows him to quickly bounce in and out of range, setting a rhythm to disguise his entries and draw out his opponent’s offense. If they react to the forward bounce, they’ll often end up hitting air, while if they stop reacting, Chandler can bounce in behind it and take them by surprise.

Chandler’s best work comes from covering distance, but a consistent jab at range allows him to score and keep his workrate up without constantly expending energy. Those explosive bursts take a lot of energy and Chandler often needs to take breaks to recover, so the jab also dissuades his opponent from advancing during these lulls in activity.

He’ll often use a dipping jab to take his head off-line while throwing or get beneath the opponent's offense, turning the jab into an effective counter weapon and a level change threat. The beauty of the dipping jab is that he doesn’t need to see the shot coming and react, as entering with a dip will naturally create those counter opportunities if his opponent punches at the same time.

His jab also works as a tool to draw out offense and set up big counter punches:

Chandler isn’t a great counterpuncher in general, but flashing his jab with the intent to draw out offense is the one situation where he can consistently land counters. It lets him set the initiative of an exchange and forces an opponent’s reaction to come on his terms, when he’s expecting it and in position to respond.

Chandler’s jab is useful on the lead to set up his big right hand. The in and out jabbing disguises quick 1-2 combinations, and crafty foot and hand feints hide his explosive bursts. He can also play with rhythm, setting a calm rhythm with jab feints before changing temp and exploding in with a quick right.

Chandler’s most effective work comes at mid-range. He’ll try to capitalize when opponents back into the cage, but he’s not very active in forcing them there.

Chandler’s bladed stance leaves an opening to circle past his lead leg, but he uses a leaping lead hook to catch opponents circling left and square them up for a right hand or takedown. He lacks an effective herding tactic to his right side however, defaulting to large, committed swings, so opponents can usually freely circle out after he’s backed them up.

Since Chandler tends to work in short bursts and struggles to herd his man into punches, he relies heavily on mixups to land his big punches. By pairing attacks with similar preliminary motions, Chandler can condition his opponent to react to a particular attack, then build further offense off that same motion to exploit those reactions.

Most of Chandler’s mixups come off his level change. Chandler’s offensive wrestling gives his level changes a built in threat, and he’s constantly showing them to keep the level change in his opponent’s mind. The basic principle is simple - prioritize defending the takedown too much and you risk eating strikes off the level change, prioritize the strikes and you risk ceding a takedown.

Chandler uses a long-range body straight to needle his man at range and set up further offense. The body straight flows perfectly into takedowns, as the penetration step on the takedown mirrors the punch’s delivery.

When opponents are conditioned to expect the body straight, Chandler will pair it with a straight to the head.

He’ll either throw it in combination after the body shot, or begin with the same level change and throw it to the head instead. If opponents are changing levels with him in anticipation of the takedown or body straights, he’ll adjust the target to catch them in their crouch.

A natural reaction to the long body straight is to back away from it, and Chandler capitalizes on this by shifting forward. He’ll let the momentum of the straight carry him forward and shift or leap to an outside angle in a southpaw stance, shortening the path of a massive left hook.

An opponent will have seen many naked body shots before he uses this, so a sudden follow-up catches them by surprise. The setup is also effective because an overextending rear punch typically signals the end of an engagement, letting the opponent know they can safely disengage and reset. But Chandler lets his overextension carry him forward, often with a slight weave of his head to avoid counters.

Chandler will also employ the level change uppercut typical of the right-handed-wrestler archetype. Constant level changes force the opponent to change levels with him to prevent the takedown, and Chandler exploits that by baiting them to duck onto an uppercut.

He also uses the classic level change overhand, faking a takedown and bursting forward with a big right when the opponent reacts.

He further builds off this entry by using the threat of the overhand to his advantage. Opponents widen their guard or duck to avoid the overhand, and Chandler pairs it with straights and uppercuts to exploit the adjusted guard.

While Chandler is crafty and intelligent about applying his burst offense, he has several limitations that force him to rely mostly on bursts and prevent him from applying more consistent offense in exchanges.

Relying so heavily on his jab to work at range and initiate his offense means that he can be cut off offensively if opponents can consistently deny or counter the jab. He’s struggled to find entries when opponents can extend the distance and use footwork to stay out of jabbing range, or throw out a high volume of non-committal strikes that have greater range than his jab.

While his jab is an effective setup for his power punches, on its own it’s a fairly one note punch without a lot of variation or finesse, which can make it predictable and susceptible to counters.

Chandler’s committed, explosive motions open up counter opportunities when he’s entering, but he’s at his most vulnerable when he’s exiting exchanges. Chandler has an extreme preference for distinct exchanges that begin and end cleanly. He constantly resets within range of his opponent, if he can’t find range on his jab, in reaction to feints, or if his opponent does something unexpected. These resets usually take his feet out of position, squaring him up, crossing his feet, bouncing back out of stance, or standing up high out of his crouch, giving opponents a chance to capitalize.

He usually exits exchanges in unsafe ways, and often rushes the exit when exchanges get messy, leaving him directly in front of an attacking opponent with his feet and posture in poor position to both attack and defend. His wide, linear stance exacerbates the issue by making it more difficult to extract himself after committing his weight, but it’s a fundamental problem with his footwork at its core.

These footwork issues show up when opponents lead too. When charged, Chandler tends to respond by backing up in a straight line, his first step taking his feet out of position and disarming him as a counter threat.

These issues in his footwork and positioning highlight why his counterpunching relies on using his jab to seize the initiative, as without that he’s rarely in position to throw back.

Chandler’s defensive system compounds the issue with his footwork in exchanges. MMA fighters rarely employ a classic high guard, but most tend to keep their hands higher to block during pocket exchanges. The ones that keep their hands at their hips all the time tend to avoid exchanges entirely. Chandler does neither and his hands are rarely used on defense, but he often finds himself in exchanges. This means that the only thing preventing Chandler from being hit clean in the pocket is the threat of him hitting back.

His lack of a guard is particularly dangerous when he’s stunned, as opponents can swarm him without the mitigating effect of a high guard. When he’s tired and hurt, he often becomes a sitting duck on the cage with no guard to bail him out. It can also hurt Chandler’s chances of finishing the fight when he has an opponent hurt - he’s all offense when he’s swarming, giving opponents chances to back him off with counters and earn space to recover.

Chandler’s level changes give him a measure of built in protection when entering an exchange, but his head movement is fairly predictable. Chandler only uses his rear hip for defense, ducking down by bending his legs or folding over the rear hip. His lead hip is a nonfactor, only used rarely when he’s stepping back into southpaw or bringing his feet together, both cases disarming any potential counters.

If opponents can feint him into a defensive motion or anticipate Chandler ducking, they know where his head is going to be and can capitalize with upward-arching strikes that target the level change. These strikes can also be used preemptively to dissuade the level change.

The bladed stance and frequent linear movement leave Chandler vulnerable to leg kicks. With his knee naturally turned in, kicks target the tender bits of the leg and knock his balance off easier, while making it harder for him to check. Many opponents have had success landing hard, clean leg kicks without much setup due to this.

However, Chandler is smart and knows that opponents will likely target the vulnerable leg. Recently he’s become better at pulling his lead leg back at the knee to make kicks miss low or connect on the bony part of the knee. His bouncing movement also lets him draw these kicks out to defend, dissuading their use. Chandler’s power and speed make naked kicks dangerous as well, as he’s always a threat to time them with a right hand or a takedown.

While he’s become better at mitigating the opening, an intelligent leg kick attack can still give him a lot of problems.

The biggest issue for Chandler is that an astute leg kicker can use them to take away the jab that he relies on. Jabbing requires committing weight to your front foot, which prevents you from checking the kicks. If timed right, the jab can be used as a trigger to time a hard leg kick. Justin Gaethje was able to cripple Chandler’s jab by targeting it with leg kicks. Crafty leg kickers can also capitalize on Chandler’s stance and avoid counters by setting them up with feints or kicking at the end of an exchange.

Chandler has an explosive shot in open space and his constant level changes help disguise his takedowns:

When he’s able to get in on the hips clean he’s a brilliant, explosive finisher, but a lack of diverse entries and chain wrestling make it hard for him to finish if the first shot is defended.

Chandler is good at attacking in transition though and using the opportunities created by his grappling to land strikes, and vice-versa. He’ll use flying knees to stand opponents up for takedowns, attack while they’re standing up to draw their hands up before immediately re-shooting, and strike off failed takedown attempts.

His cage wrestling is similar to his distance wrestling - if he can lock his hands around your hips, you’re going for a ride. But his chain wrestling process isn’t as good, which means that he struggles to achieve that position from neutral clinch exchanges.

Most of his cage takedowns are set up with a flurry of punches to draw the attention up before shooting in clean on the hips - the leaping lead hook is useful here to cut opponents off and close distance for the takedown.

On the ground, Chandler is a top control specialist with a focus on doing damage inside the guard. He keeps a wide base and has strong ground and pound, especially when postured up.

When opponents try to post up in guard, he’ll control the posting wrist to collapse their posture, using the inside wrist control to punch with impunity.

In open space, Chandler can sometimes struggle to get his weight fully over his opponent which can result in him getting tied up. He’s also not a great guard passer and opponents have had success framing him away and getting their feet on the hips without having to worry too much about having their guard passed.

When Chandler has his man’s head on the cage, these barriers are removed and he has an easier time getting his weight right over their body and reigning down ferocious ground and pound.

However, Chandler struggles to keep strong defensive grapplers down along the cage, as he lacks advanced cage riding tactics:

If his opponent abandons their guard, Chandler will try to grab a wrist or sit on a leg, but he doesn’t use the riding sub-positions we’ve seen developed by strong cage wrestlers recently, which leaves a lot of space for opponents to stand up and limits his ability to do damage, as his hands are occupied controlling the body and rarely free to punch.

Chandler has an excellent front headlock which aids his control on the mat and allows him to shut down his opponents’ transitions. The front headlock is useful to control opponents attempting to stand up by turning into him and can also turn an opponent’s takedown attempt into a control position for Chandler.

Once he’s secured the front headlock, Chandler will often use the threat of a guillotine to force opponents onto their back, walking himself back into half guard and hooking the leg to secure his control. His confidence in his front headlock allows him to create space and hit in wild flurries without risking a loss of control.

Because Chandler spends most of his time in guard, he’s rarely in position to threaten a submission, but he has solid chokes when he gets past the guard. His rear naked choke is his most consistent submission, and he’s always a threat to finish it when he takes his opponent’s back. Chandler’s insane squeeze and hip pressure makes him perfectly comfortable finishing with a quicker short choke, locking his palms together instead of connecting his hand to the bicep.

He sets the choke up by sliding a forearm across the face and using it to pry up on the underside of the nose to expose the neck, before sliding his opposite arm under the neck to secure the choke. If his opponent clamps their chin down or fights the choking hand before he can get it under the neck, he’ll keep switching his arms, prying up with one and sliding under with the other until it works. A simple but effective way to brute force a rear naked choke.

As Chandler is an excellent defensive wrestler, he rarely finds himself on his back, but he has a coherent process when he ends up there. Recognizing that staying on his back could mean losing the round, Chandler immediately looks to belly down and build his base up to a quad pod.

This strategy is high risk/high reward. It gives him a much better chance of getting back to his feet quickly, but it also exposes his back and risks putting him in an even worse position.

Fortunately, Chandler is brilliant at escaping back control. He looks to control the choking arm and lift it overhead or pass it across his body to strip the opponent’s upper body control, before rapidly turning into them. Often he’ll work toward the overhook side as he fights for control of the arm, baiting the opponent into adjusting their lower body control to favor that side, before rapidly spinning to the opposite side. By working toward the overhook side, he can also create hip misalignment that helps make his rapid turn smoother.

Chandler is extremely consistent about escaping the back and few opponents have been able to stay there for long, but he has a lot more difficulty when opponents are able to stay on top and flatten him out with hooks or a body triangle. This isn’t easy, however, as Chandler has very active and powerful hips, and constantly works to turn belly-up when stuck in back mount.

As recently as the Gaethje fight, Chandler has been experimenting with using a light, noncommittal jab to work steadily inside without having to rapidly cover distance.

This allowed him to fire off some combos to the body, but it was a double edged sword. His pocket defense is still an issue and this lighter jab meant spending more time at a range where he could be smashed with counters he had no answer to.

As a final wrinkle in Chandler’s game, he’s a lot smarter about open-stance matchups than most orthodox power punchers tend to be.

Whereas a lot of them default to sloppily trying to reach with the rear hand against southpaws, Chandler has shown an understanding of how to set up his rear hand with hand traps, footwork, and lead hand work.

Chandler also possesses a quick, snappy, mechanically sound rear body kick - a brilliant tactic for a shorter man to invest in, as it allows him to stay competitive at long range and close distance without overextending. Chandler is actually better at keeping southpaws on the cage, as the body kick acts as an effective herding strike that he lacks against orthodox fighters. Chandler will also punch off his body kicks, stepping in directly off the kick and firing a right hand while his opponent is occupied defending the kick.

In the second Henderson fight, Chandler experimented with some interesting shifting attacks to close distance against the southpaw. After finding success working inside with his hands to a mirrored southpaw stance, he quickly found the knockout by shifting forward off a parried body kick.

Chandler has only fought a couple southpaws so he hasn’t had many chances to show off his work in open-stance engagements, but he’ll get another chance this weekend at UFC 281 as he faces southpaw boxer, Dustin Poirier.