Can Mackenzie Dern continue to have grappling success without consistent wrestling?
A gold medal at the ADCC Submission Fighting World Championships does not always guarantee success in MMA. However, the grappling event is still rather prestigious and converts to the caged sport are regularly given opportunities and fanfare. Even Mark Robinson, who somewhat famously used little more than posture and wrist control to defeat Vitor Belfort, Ricco Rodriguez and Jeff Monson on the way to the over 99 kg title at the 2001 edition of ADCC, earned a shot in the UFC after only one MMA fight.
Mackenzie Dern won her ADCC title in 2015 in the under 60 kg division, and she made her MMA debut the following year. She won five fights before getting the call up to the UFC in 2018. In the Octagon, she has gone 7-2 and finds herself on the cusp of title contention in the strawweight division.
Her grappling background has obviously been a major factor in her success. She has won four of her seven wins via submission, and has averaged 1.98 submission attempts per 15 minutes. That rate ranks 10th among all currently ranked fighters.
One of the biggest divergences between competitive grappling and grappling for MMA is the level of engagement. In grappling matches, the entire point of the contest is to enter the grappling realm. In MMA, fighters are not under an obligation to engage and often have success avoiding it entirely. Even in some straight grappling contests, competitors have had success simply defending and avoiding exchanges. For example, Brendan Schaub, who managed only two submission attempts in his 11-fight UFC career, went to a 20-minute draw against four-time ADCC medalist Roberto “Cyborg” Abreu in a grappling match.
While her grappling prowess has led her to success, Dern has had trouble forcing the grappling exchanges on her opponents at times. She averages only 0.46 takedowns per 15 minutes of fight time, which ranks 141st among ranked fighters. On one hand, you could argue that it is impressive she is still able to get to her submission game without scoring takedowns. On the other hand, you could easily envision her having trouble in a fight where someone keeps the fight standing.
Dern has made strides with her standup striking, but she still has a negative striking differential overall. She lands 3.16 significant strikes per minute and absorbs 4.35 per minute for a -1.19 differential. Including only strikes landed at distance, that is standing and not in the clinch, her differential is slightly worse at -1.39.
Yan has the better differential overall (+1.89) and at distance (+1.92). While she is not a particularly accurate striker as she lands only 42% of her significant strike attempts, she certainly makes up for that with volume. In her UFC career, she has attempted 13.36 significant strike attempts, which is the 15th highest rate among ranked fighters.
Yan comes into this fight after back-to-back losses, but she might have the chance to pull the upset if she can keep the feet standing. In her UFC career, she has allowed 1.06 takedowns per 15 minutes and been held in control positions for 22% of her fight time. These are not disastrous defensive grappling numbers.
Two fighters have notched submission attempts against Yan in the UFC. She survived a leg lock attempt against Karolina Kowalkiewicz, and a triangle choke from Angela Hill. Yan’s defense in those situations did not inspire a great deal of confidence, but she persevered and won both bouts by decision.
The only fighter to truly dominate Yan on the floor so far has been Carla Esparza. The flyweight champion landed all three of her takedown attempts, collected 7:18 of control time and finished the fight in the second round thanks to 26 significant ground strikes. It is hard to see Dern duplicating that type of performance. As previously stated, she is not that kind of wrestler and has landed only 42 significant ground strikes in nine fights. With that being said, Dern might not need much of an opening to make an impact with her submission game.
The length of the fight plays in both directions. Dern has 25 minutes to hunt for a submission, while 25 minutes is a long time to face off against a high volume striker when you would rather be grappling.