Derrick Lewis vs. Tai Tuivasa

Unsurprisingly, this fight is really only coming down to a single stat. Standing Ratio. What is Standing Ratio you ask? It is a statistic I created when researching my video on Ciryl Gane which you can find here. Standing Ratio refers to the amount of standing strikes a fighter lands to every 1 they absorb. It is a useful measure of distance striking skill and helps us to project how many strikes a fighter will land and absorb.

Derrick has a .67 Standing ratio. In English, Derrick lands 2 strikes for every 3 he absorbs. Tai on the other hand comes in at 1.31 strikes landed per absorbed. Good for 7th among ranked Heavyweights. Obviously, these two fighters are KO bangers (Derrick 13 KOs most at HW, Tai 6 KOs 5th among ranked HW). So I am not recreating the wheel here thinking that this fight comes down to the KO. Tai's standing ratio makes a great case for his victory but lets talk one other stat to measure power: Standing Strikes Landed per Knockdown (SSLpKD). Derrick comes in at a 28 which is 6th among ranked HWs, Tai on the otherhand has a 35 SSLpKD good for 8th among ranked HW. Derrick wins the one punch power battle but Tai has a better offense to defense balance.

So where do I see this one going? Personally, I see Derrick winning this fight. Derrick has shown the ability to take power punches in the past whereas Tai has been stunned by lesser power punchers like Greg Hardy. The tipping point here comes from the standing ratio of the two fighters so if Tai is going to take this one, he needs to lean on his striking defense which is pretty much absent from Lewis' game. Interested in more data analysis and MMA? Sign up for our newsletter here!