Mixed martial arts (MMA) is a super-fast, action-packed sport. But what makes it so exciting to watch makes it very hard to score. Fighters can throw furious, multi-strike combinations and transition quickly from position to position in a split second. At its most active, the sport is simply impossible to score accurately in real-time.
MMA statistics, though quite interesting and unlike traditional sport analytics, haven’t been as extensively studied as other sports. The UFC’s system for recording fight level data is based on the original FightMetric system, where each row represents the statistics of one fighter in a single round of a fight.
One statistic that often sparks debate is "significant strikes." Let's delve into what they are, how they're counted, and why different statistical sources might present varying numbers.
What are Significant Strikes?
A quick definition: significant strikes refer to all strikes at distance and power strikes in the clinch and on the ground. Or to flip it around: all punches and kicks are significant strikes except short strikes in the clinch or on the ground.
In standup fights, jabs and short leg kicks count just as well toward significant strikes. Fighters can throw furious, multi-strike combinations and transition quickly from position to position in a split second. All fights start with the fighters on their feet. Standup fights are characterized by strikes, a catch-all term for punches, kicks and elbows.
Read also: Mastering Muay Thai Strikes
It's a good source but since they started keeping stats on significant strikes I never understood the point really. Significant strikes is an opinion.
The Challenge of Accurate MMA Statistics
MMA is a super-fast, action-packed sport. But what makes it so exciting to watch makes it very hard to score. Fighters can throw furious, multi-strike combinations and transition quickly from position to position in a split second. At its most active, the sport is simply impossible to score accurately in real-time.
Definitions are not an issue in sports like baseball where everyone understands what a home run is. In MMA, however, a word like takedown could mean different things to different observers. And unless everyone scoring fights uses the same criteria for a takedown, it will be impossible to produce consistent takedown statistics.
FightMetric's Approach
To guarantee that all statistics are collected using the same criteria, FightMetric has established strict definitions for all the metrics it tracks. Rather than trying to keep up or relying on inaccurate data, FightMetric insists on the use of slow motion. As much as FightMetric is a data company, it is also a technology company. FightMetric has made significant investments in technology to make certain it is always on the cutting-edge.
To eliminate human error, FightMetric’s quality control algorithms analyze data as its being scored and check it against more than 7,500 scored rounds in our historical database. If any anomalies are found in the new data, the system will throw a warning so the scorer can re-watch the action, make corrections if necessary, and attest that the abnormal data is still valid and not an error.
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Despite rigorous training and strict definitions, small differences will inevitably exist in the tendencies of scorers. To assign a different scorer to each fighter in a fight creates an unfair standard and reduces the usefulness of the data, as it’s impossible to guarantee a strict apples-to-apples comparison. Similarly, FightMetric assigns one scorer per fight.
FightMetric strives to compile data in the most accurate and consistent way humanly possible.
Why the Discrepancies? FightMetric vs. Other Sources
You may notice that FightMetric's data often differs from other sources like Compustrike. The problem I have with fightmetric is significant strikes landed. They have no basis for what strike is significant. If fighter A lands 12 strikes in rd 1 that they decide are not significant than he would have 12 total with 0 being significant. Fighter B could land 1 strike with it being considered significant. So in a 5 rd fight we could have fighter A technically land 60 total strikes but fightmetric has decided by whatever their standard is that 0 were significant and fighter B lands 5 strikes total and according to fightmetric 5 significant. They would give the fight to fighter B with their criteria which we don't really understand even know he was outstruck 60 to 5.
If you read through this, it explains exactly why FightMetrics data cannot be compared to Compustrike data. FightMetric strives to compile data in the most accurate and consistent way humanly possible.
As an analogy, though different umpires may call a tighter or looser strike zone, both teams in a game have to deal equally with that strike zone. It would be unfair to assign one umpire to call balls and strikes against one team and a different umpire to work the plate for the other.
Read also: College Success of Jaylon Tyson
Understanding Striking Accuracy
One of the most common ways to evaluate a fighter is his or her significant striking accuracy. This statistic is included on a per round basis in the dataset. Striking accuracy resembles a normal distribution with the average fighter landing around 40% of their punches.
When we look at a fighter’s Striking Accuracy, we are seeing how often their land strikes, but we are mostly seeing the kinds of strikes they choose to throw. Those that throw more of those short range strikes will likely have a higher Striking Accuracy than those that throw mostly long range strikes.
Expected Striking Accuracy
Last Saturday, at UFC Fight Night: Adesanya vs. Imavov, UFC introduced a new statistic designed to help explain if a fighter’s striking accuracy in a fight should be considered good or bad. It first looks at the mix of strikes a fighter throws and calculates an Expected Striking Accuracy. Once we have their Expected Striking Accuracy, we compare that to their actual Striking Accuracy to see if they are doing better or worse than expected. If they are doing better, the number will be positive.
Comparing Fighters Across Weight Divisions
One way to deal with differences between weight divisions is to to compare the strikes a fighter lands to the amount that is expected. But how do we get the expected number of strikes? First, we calculate the average accuracy for each weight class. Then we multiply this by the number of strikes attempted by a fighter in a particular fight. This number is in essence the number of significant strikes that would have landed, were they attempted by an average fighter of the respective weight class.
Plotting the three different flavors of expected significant strikes, the positional version seems the most consistent, as it over- or under-estimates the number of significant strikes the least. Quantifying by how much a fighter under- or over performs the expected strikes per fight means we can rank fighters irrespective of weight division.
This type of metric is often called efficiency in other sports, and an efficiency score of 1.1 would indicate that a fighter out strikes expectations by 10% on average.
The FightMetric Effectiveness Score
The FightMetric Effectiveness Score is based on qualitative and quantitative research into the things that matter most in ending a fight. Only things that win fights and confer advantages should score points. Power matters a great deal.
With the exception of slams, takedowns are only valuable insofar as they set up more valuable opportunities on the ground. Little things, like body jabs on the ground, will never end a fight, but they do set-up important things like submissions and guard passes. Cuts, swelling, and tight joint locks end fights both by doctor’s stoppage and by impairing a fighter’s ability to perform. It is unimportant what technique a fighter uses to execute a takedown or a guard pass.
Total Performance Rating (TPR)
The Total Performance Rating (TPR) is a statistic used to measure the quality of a fighter’s performance. Scored on a scale between 0-100, TPR provides an easy way to measure and compare performance in any single fight, whether 30 seconds or 30 minutes long.
*Meaningful accuracy stats cannot be measured for a fighter who attempts less than 20 offensive techniques. In those cases, Accuracy does not factor into of the formula.
Weights for the components were informed by FightMetric analysis and results from a survey of over 200 MMA fans.
Top Fighters by Significant Strike Accuracy
The fourth in our series going through the categories on our UFC Official Records page, this post deals with the record holders for the highest significant strike accuracy.
What: This percentage or "rate" stat is just like completion percentage in football or free throw percentage in basketball. It simply divides the number of significant strikes landed by the number attempted and produces an accuracy percentage.
Why: This is one of the easiest stats to grasp. Fighters who land a higher percentage of their strikes can be more efficient and waste less energy on missed techniques. The relatively high strike requirement of 350 attempts ensures that a fighter who makes this list must demonstrate high-percentage striking over a long enough period of time to smooth out variance caused by one or two bad fights.
Top 10 Fighters with Highest Significant Strike Accuracy:
| Rank | Fighter | Total |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Anderson Silva | 68.4% |
| 2 | Cheick Kongo | 61.3% |
| 3 | Cain Velasquez | 60.9% |
| 4 | Lyoto Machida | 60.1% |
| 5 | Evan Tanner | 59.0% |
| 6 | Randy Couture | 58.7% |
| 7 | Georges St-Pierre | 56.2% |
| 8 | Matt Hughes | 55.2% |
| 9 | Mauricio Rua | 54.8% |
| 10 | Caol Uno | 54.6% |
The Takeaway: The most impressive thing about the presence of fighters like Silva and Machida on this list is that they are primarily distance strikers. The majority of the fighters here are either clinch strikers or ground fighters. Accuracy goes up quite a bit when the fighters' range gets closer.
Like the list of significant strike volume leaders, this list contains seven current or former champions. In fact, Cheick Kongo is the only fighter here not to have fought in at least one title fight. But while these champions show high levels of accuracy, it is not a prerequisite for success. There exist other strategies that have proven successful that do not rely on efficiency at all. To wit, Chuck Liddell's striking accuracy is 37.3% and he knocked out people just fine.
tags: #mma #significant #strikes #stats