The Severe Spotlight: Julian Erosa

There is exponential value in veteran tests. This has been a theme of this segment for the years that it has been written. The veteran test is one that should be deeply respected. Often the “veterans” are fighters moulded from a failing of personal expectation. A failure to achieve the seed of greatness that likely was sewn in a storm at the inception of their MMA career.  The seed grows, make no mistake about it, but it grows with misshapen roots, lacking in the complete structure to form a perfectly straight, strong stem, and the flower that blooms is beautiful and fruitful, but doesn’t quite get the full gaze of the suns smile.

Julian Erosa, as he like many other veterans has meandered through their career, hitting the walls of the torrid and tumultuous MMA river, bouncing through the chicanes of the estuaries taking bumps and bruises, but clinging on with grit and determination get worn into, eroded to a very dangerous crustation on the very same bed of the MMA river. Fighters that come across his territory in the river, must be prepared to navigate it with the appropriate tools, as otherwise, the risk of drowning is high.

Christian Rodriguez, a young and hungry fighter bounds out and attempts to establish an early element of dominance. Erosa doesn’t blink, working his head movement and the threat of the check left hook, left teep and a stiff right hand to deter the pressure of Rodriguez. Inside those first thirty seconds, Erosa has found that he is able to navigate those pocket exchanges by offering long hooks and uppercuts whilst rotating his head through the planes of the straight shots coming from Rodriguez.

What becomes interesting as the fight continues through the next thirty seconds is that Rodriguez begins to wait a little longer, already he is noticing that he cannot just be the aggressor, his footwork is putting him in an offensive cycle, but he has learnt that Erosa is too smart and too skilled to be just walked down and punished for actions. Now he is waiting on Erosa to strike, or to feint to begin his own combinations.

The momentum continues to swing as a brief intermission for a gumshield replacement see’s Erosa start out on the front foot, hunting down Rodriguez across the canvas. Notice the looseness in his shoulders, in his jaw and yet the laser focus in the gaze. Both men have had moments in the 1.5 minutes that this fight has lasted so far, both have landed shots and landed well. Yet the body language of the veteran is one of ease. The goading begins, the questioning as to where in only 90 seconds the initial pressure, the initial venom has retracted too; whether we like it or not, whether we appreciate its beauty or not, that is high level fighting.

In previous fights, the confidence that builds in Erosa, the allowance to take shots in the pocket has been his downfall – Nate Diaz-esque he relies sometimes on the ability to take damage to land it. The same exists in this fight – the knee up the middle, the teep to the face, the willingness to allow shots to come in so he can drive the uppercut into Rodriguez are old Erosa tropes, and they make for entertaining fights almost always, but these are also the moments that fighters like Rodriguez must look to capitalise on with aplomb.

Erosa checks a leg kick from Rodriguez, who wears the expression of a man beginning to drown. The check hurts Rodriguez, as does the follow up elbow from Erosa, from the right-hand side, perfectly behind the guard and onto the join of the jaw, forcing Rodriguez backwards. The left hook and overhand right prove to be a valiant lifeboat for Rodrguez as he returns the hurt ball firmly to the endzone of Erosa.

Battling back with a succession of jabs, he pulls a right body kick from Rodriguez, catches and trips the back leg. As Rodriguez tries to build Erosa laces his right leg through to lock a body triangle as he cuts the angle to solidify back control. Switching between kimura grips and landing elbows allows Rodriguez time to misalign his spine from the chest of Erosa and begin to build height. Erosa loses the scramble and ends up on bottom in an open guard situation.

A common getup for the guard player is to take either a 100% percent grip, or a far lat “Overback” grip of your partner to begin to control posture, you can then look to either build height up to an elbow or palm, whilst getting your feet to your partners hips before beginning your get up. Rodriguez makes a large mistake, he begins with solid head position but allows Erosa to create both space, and postural breaking, and Erosa with 19 seconds left, looks to wrap up a guillotine. Rodrguez tries to build height, but Erosa has punched an arm-out guillotine very tight and is side crunching the head of Rodriguez to the Erosa hip. Erosa shoots his legs out and into a tight closed guard, and the tap comes almost immediately.

A veteran’s performance.