UFC 137 Results: Critiquing BJ Penn's Performance Against Nick Diaz

BJ Penn came out strong against Nick Diaz at UFC 137 last night, but began to peter out halfway through the second round.

Unfortunately for Penn (and many of us fight fans), he didn’t seem to have an answer for Diaz’s brash and unorthodox fighting style.

So what went wrong? Read on to see a critique of Penn’s performance.

Grappling

For most of this fight, when the action shifted to the cage Penn was the one being shoved up against it. Penn is a smaller welterweight and it seamed that Diaz was just too big for him to handle.

At one point when the fight did go to the ground, Penn seemed to be moving around okay, but couldn’t quite get a dominant position on Diaz.

Eventually Diaz got to his feet and BJ was never able to get him down again. It looked like Penn might have needed some more strength training if he wanted to stay in there with Diaz.

Takedowns

Penn only had one take down in this entire fight and it was early in the first round. Penn got Diaz to the ground, the two rolled a bit, and Penn ended up on top, but he failed to do much with it.

It could have been a combination of things that made it difficult for the Jiu Jitsu expert to work his game on Diaz. Perhaps he underestimated Diaz’s defense, but more likely he didn’t realize how strong Diaz is.

Penn attempted another takedown in the second, but was unsuccessful. From there on out whenever it looked like he might go in for a takedown, Penn was fed a straight left from Diaz whenever he tried.

Diaz’s striking is what ended up scaring Penn away from the takedown, although he did try two more times in the third round.

Cardio

Cardio ended up playing a huge role in this fight. Diaz is known for having a relentless pace and some out of this world conditioning, while Penn has been known to run out of gas in big fights.

Diaz is able to bring it to his opponents without stopping and it seemed like Penn just wasn’t ready for it.

Each round saw Penn coming out with a little less in his gas tank. In the first round he looked pretty solid, about half way through the second he began to fade, and by two minutes into the third, “The Prodigy” was struggling to catch his breath.

Diaz on the other hand didn’t slow down at all and continually landed shot after shot as Penn tiredly let his hands fall to his sides.

Game Plan

It’s not really clear what Penn’s game plan was going into this fight. You have to give the guy credit for continuing to stand with Diaz, but it seemed like Penn was scared off of trying for the takedown.

BJ just didn’t have a solid game plan, or if he did, he really didn’t execute it very well.

Even if this fight had gone to the ground it doesn’t seem like Penn would have been able to do much as he would have run out of steam before Diaz.

Striking

Striking was the story of this fight. Diaz was just the better striker by the end of the fight.

Penn came out looking really good on his feet in the beginning of this match up. He was able to land some great shots and two really solid defensive uppercuts.

It was really Penn’s cardio that let him down in this fight though. While striking was surely the deciding factor on the judges score cards, BJ just couldn’t hang in there with the likes of Diaz.

Once Penn showed even the slightest bit of weakness, Diaz was all over him and never quit coming.