The Coaching Impact of Trevor Wittman
JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA - MAY 09: Justin Gaethje celebrates after his TKO victory over Tony Ferguson in their UFC interim lightweight championship fight during the UFC 249 event at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena on May 09, 2020 in Jacksonville, Florida. (Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC)
“Keep it simple, keep it simple, okay? You are breaking him, but it’s your jab that’s going to break him, then you can find your power. We don’t need more than 4 punch combinations”
Throughout the history of MMA, fighters have routinely overthought things. In a sport like none other, where two straight losses can often mean being out of a job, fighters deviate from what they do best in hopes to find a new complex strategy that should, on paper at least, beat their opponent. While strategizing and adapting to an opponent is never a bad idea, if a poor coach is orchestrating it, they can take their fighters away from their strengths and overwhelm them with new information that a 8-12 week camp just cannot handle. Trevor Wittman, on the other hand, finds the right mix between highlighting his fighter’s strengths, while still adapting them and game-planning for each opponent they have. So, how does he do this?
Well, he does a multitude of things but keeps it all fundamental and basic. Most importantly, he builds his fighters from the ground up. All of his fighters have a strong stance that gives them a base for defense and offense, understand how to position themselves when trying to exchange, and know how to move around the cage. In MMA, these three things are fundamental, but are still among some of the toughest tactics for even the upper echelon of fighters to figure out. For example, let’s take a look at ATT’s Renato Moicano positioning when trying to exchange.
As Rafael Fiziev, a blisteringly fast puncher, blitzes forward, Moicano throws out a lazy jab as a bit of a counter. Now, Moicano’s stance is already quite bladed, which is great for leading with his jab and counter-kicking, but here it works against him. The counter jab extended his stance out, throwing him completely off balance. Moicano does not want to bulled over, so he tries to square himself up to give him some base to frame. But, squaring yourself up in the pocket is a death wish vs a quick puncher and he pays the price. This is a drastic example of poor positioning.
Aldo does not even have to blitz in here as Fiziev did to exploit Moicano’s positioning. Moicano tries to counter Aldo’s knee with a knee + lead hook, but drops his front leg back into a square stance doing so. This gives Aldo a clean angle from which to land the hook from, but also takes away the power from Moicano’s own punches as there is little hip movement. During Aldo’s flurry, Moicano falls into bad habits as he retreats. He has a drifting lead leg that takes away his base and squares him up, giving Aldo a chance to rip the body.
Moicano has bad issues with positioning; he squares the stance mid-exchange, has a drifting lead leg, over-steps, loses balance in an already very bladed stance, and breaks stance when he feels that he is under fire. Now, this is not meant to be a critique of Moicano’s every issue, as plenty of fighters share these exact same struggles that Moicano has and I actually quite like Moicano as a fighter. Rather, Moicano has just proved to be a fantastic example of the dire consequences that just a moment of poor positioning can have on a fighter that does not have Ferguson-level durability or Ngannou-level athleticism and gives you a sense of why Wittman places such an emphasis on footwork and positioning in his fighters. He even made a DVD about it!
Now, let’s take a look at some of Trevor Wittman’s fighters and how they look to position themselves during exchanges.
This is more of a comparative point - look at the difference in the stances of Katona (Grey) and Wittman-trained Lopez (Black). Lopez is balanced throughout and is able to pull his head back when Katona tries to counter. Watch Katona’s feet, he jumps into his punch and completely loses his balance in the exchange. Compare this to Lopez, who is consistently balanced and in stance, ready to throw shots or pull back depending on Katona’s reaction.
As Rose Namajunas retreats, she pivots while throwing a check hook, forcing Andrade to follow and turn with her where she can land a quick little counter and then pivot into a clinch up to stay safe.
Let’s take a look at Gaethje’s stance. He keeps a balanced, short, and up-right stance, which lets him fluidly transfer weight over his hips defensively and mask his offense. Gaethje always trains his lead foot in the direction of his opponent’s center line, which prevents him from squaring up mid-exchange like Moicano does. As he weaves into the pocket with a rear body hook, he pivots off his front foot and forces Barboza to be squared up relative to himself. This gives him an easy hook into collar tie, where he can control Barboza’s posture (and therefore his power) and then readjust his stance safely instead of just drifting his lead leg back. As he walks forward into his flurry’s along the fence, watch him use frames and short side-steps to constantly adjust his front foot to Barboza’s center line.
As you can see, nothing that Gaethje, Rose, or Lopez are doing is incredibly advanced. They do not look like a prime Chocolatito exchanging with SSR, but they are doing the simple fundamental things that work - things you do not always see in MMA. These simple footwork cues give Wittman’s fighters a base to counter, lead, and defend from and allow his fighters to out-position much of the current MMA competition.
Shorter, balanced stance and trained front foot on opponent’s center-line. Rose deviates from this, but that seems to be an exception to the rule.
Short steps to re-adjust mid exchange. Big steps, in any direction, are typically bad news in an exchange. This applies to “drifting” the lead leg as well, as Moicano did.
Using pivots to create an angle to strike/clinch from and to catch opponent’s as they re-adjust to the pivot. Max Holloway is brilliant at this, as he forced Brian Ortega to constantly turn with him and hit Ortega as he was adjusting. Rose Namajunas, although to a lesser extent, is also a solid example.
If stance gets broken or a big adjustment needs to be made, use those short-steps and pivots to angle (Rose clip) into a tie-up!
Again, these are all basic things, but things that Wittman’s fighters follow to a tee and have seen plenty of success from.
Shutting the Door and Stopping Pressure
A commonality between Wittman-trained fighters is a strong lead hook, specifically in using it a counter. This should come as no surprise, as Wittman comes from a boxing background where the check hook is the king of counters. Something unique is how each of his fighters use it in different ways. For Rose, she uses it to dissuade pressure and punish people chasing her down. For Gaethje, he will mainly use it to close the door on exchanges with an emphatic boom. For Lopez, he will do a bit of both. To me, this is something that a makes a great coach - teaching the fighters a certain principal that works and then leaving it to them to use it as they please.
In some of the coolest sequences from the Tony Ferguson fight, Gaethje would start an exchange with a leg kick, before weaving under the response with a lead hook and hopping out of range before Tony can respond. “Shutting the Door” on an exchange. Notice - this also shows the utility of Gaethje’s stance that was mentioned before. His stance allows his to cleanly shift weight over his hips as he weaves into hooks.
Stuck against the cage, Rose using a little check hook in conjunction with a pivot in order to get off-line vs Jessica Andrade. This also forces Andrade to turn, where Rose can jab to get her at range. Notice the two bounces back by Rose beforehand. This lulls Andrade to follow her that way, before the check hook shuts the pressure down. This also gives Rose some momentum for her back leg to swing around on the pivot.
Lopez clears the front kick through, before using that same-side hand to hop into a lead hook. Lopez takes advantage of Katona being off-balanced and shuts the door on the exchange with a clean lead hook around the guard.
Consistently shutting the door with this lead hook has a few main purposes:
A check hook is quite underutilized in MMA. Most fighters have some answers to an opponent countering with straight punches, but very few have answers to a good check hook. This constant threat of “shutting the door” keeps fighters honest, whether it be in paring down the length of the exchange so they do not have to face the check hook or just stop pressuring so they do not get hit.
It is a great mask for pivoting and circling movements. Plenty of fighters can strike or can move, but few can strike and move. A strong lead hook provides a lever for the hips to pivot it with the strike, getting the fighter off-line. This does open them up to leg kicks, so selection while when doing so is important. Striking and moving at the same time is genuinely a very difficult thing for fighters to grasp, with even world-champion level boxers struggling with it. It expands far beyond just a check hook + pivot, but this is a great thing that Wittman fighters use. This really helps to diffuse pressure.
It gives a good base for Wittman’s fighters to pressure. In MMA, the response to a constant check hook is not to start to pre-emptively weave under it or to pull back to counter it, it is mostly just retreating out of the pocket. This gives some space for his fighters to start to get some pressure on, as fighters worry about getting nailed with a big hook should they stay in the pocket too long.
It just works in MMA. Punching form still has a bit to go in MMA, a lot of fighters still leave their chin exposed as they blitz in and forget their feet. Wittman fighters typically have good enough mechanics to develop power in their check hooks and it really creates some collisions (Ferguson vs Gaethje - the most potent and brutal example).
Cross-Steps and L-Steps
If you have ever entered a boxing/MMA/striking gym for a meaningful period of time, you have heard a coach say “don’t cross your feet!”. This is fantastic advice, as crossing your feet with no purpose compromises your base, leaving you vulnerable for punches and kicks without the ability to counter or defend. Yet, at the highest level of combat sports, fighters like Chad Mendes, Justin Gaethje, Pernell Whitaker, and Vasyl Lomachenko all purposely cross their feet to achieve some sort of positional advantage. The key word here is purpose. Fighters who do cross-step, will do so with a specific goal in mind. Trevor Wittman is a big fan of cross-steps and it is seen in his protégé Justin Gaethje. Taken from the description of his striking DVD, “Master subtle striking concepts like the cross foot position, the drop step, and more as Trevor Wittman lays out a blueprint you can rely on in a fight.”
The primary function of cross-stepping is as an outfighting tactic. On the backfoot (when one is not pressuring) and at kickboxing range, they are a tool that forces an opponent who attacks in straight lines (or “linearly attacks”), to turn onto counters. Past kickboxing range, cross-steps serve as a tool for circling and for getting outside the opponent’s lead or rear foot, depending on the closed or open stance matchup. This will “draw” the opponent on and force them to follow to make the exchange “neutral” again, allowing counters or even entries into takedowns during that period. Getting past the lead/rear foot or forcing a turn are both examples of taking offensive angles!
Gaethje crosses his feet as he circles away, something that is typically seen as a footwork sin, but he does it to easily get outside of Ferguson’s lead foot. This baits Ferguson into chasing Gaethje down to try to line-up his entries, but Gaethje is ready for it and smacks him as he comes in. It is a great bait tool because fighters see someone with crossed feet and instantly try to catch them as they are out of stance. The cross-stepping fighter can often take advantage of this though, as Gaethje did, and quickly re-adjust and counter as they come in.
For more on cross-stepping, check out this thread!
Conclusion
Trevor Wittman is not consistently seen as one of the better coaches in MMA because he is teaching his fighters some crazy things that no one else is doing, rather because he is teaching his fighters the basics at the highest level and allowing them to use those basics in their preferred way. The coach to fighter relationship in MMA is ever-evolving, but every coach should take tenets from Trevor Wittman in how he allows his fighters to express themselves whilst keeping great basics.