The best takedown could be a left hook
Remember, when a martial artist was either a striker, a wrestler, or a submission fighter? Remember when each system stayed within its own bounds, and didn't venture into other martial arts? Those days are long gone, except for the martial arts systems that want to stay behind, and not evolve. What does evolving consist of to a martial artist? I think in the old days, Marshall Artists outwardly always thought they were better than the other systems, there was always that little doubt.
A karate guy always thought he could knock out a wrestler. "I'll just hit them on the way in, and knock him out" I used to hear Boxers or Karate guy saying. and then, when they spar, or fight a wrestler, they would start throwing their best punches, on their back, looking up at the wrestler, who had just taken them down. On the other side of that coin, I would always hear wrestler saying I'll take down any striker and smother them on the ground. Then they would run into the wrong striker, and on their way in they would meet an uppercut, or a knee and get knocked out. You could see that trend in the UFC. At first, the grapplers would train specifically to fight a striker, yet the strikers didn't think they'd have to train for the grapplers cause they could knock them out. Everybody saw quickly, that the grappler could time the strikers, punches or kicks, take them to the ground and submit them. That was not only a huge eye-opener for most strikers, but it made the world think that Grappling was superior what most uneducated spectators don't understand his that the grapplers were striking to time them, take them to the ground and submit them, yet the strikers were a little cocky, and didn't think they'd have to bother with the takedown defense, because they thought their strikes would work as a takedown defense, that does happen, sometimes, but you can't bank on a strike for a takedown defense, you have to actually learn and drill real takedown defense.
Some of the smarter strikers started working, takedown defense, so then we saw a switch in the UFC or strikers, were able to defend the takedown, but at this time the grapplers were getting a little cocky, and they weren't training their defense from strikes, because they didn't think they would need to. so for a while we saw in the UFC strikers, knocking out the grapplers. They called that sprawl and brawl. Chuck Liddell made it famous with his uncanny ability to defend takedowns, and then knock the grappler out. That went out for a while too. it was funny to watch the fans change their mind so quickly they went from being huge fans of only grapplers, now they were only fans for the strikers, but that's when the UFC was a lot more one dimensional.
The more that UFC exposed all the weaknesses in the different fighting styles. The strikers realized they had to lose their ego, and accept the fact that whether they liked it or not, they would have to learn and train defense. No matter how much they didn't want to, after they were getting taken down so easily, they realized that there was a hole in their game, and they had to fill that hole with some takedown defense. The grappler took a little longer to admit the fact there were many holes in their game. To this day, I'll meet grapplers who think they could just take down any striker they want and beat them, until they get kicked in the head by someone like Edson Barbosa.
This has been a martial artist, biggest debate for so many years. Yet at the end of the day only the completely narrowminded and egotistical, and even a touch of stupidity, martial artist, think that they don't have to learn both striking defense, and takedown defense both equally. It's taken so long for some of the systems to come along, and believe me, they're all not enlightened yet. So many martial artist are not only stubborn, but they have their head in the sand and think they system or style can always beat any other style without adapting any evolving. Those dinosaurs are getting exposed quickly, and hopefully the next generation we won't have any dinosaurs anymore in martial arts. Everyone will be a martial artist, not a partial artist. And I consider someone a partial artist, if they don't train both striking defense and takedown defense.
The majority of fighters today are equally well-versed in striking and wrestling. In fact, at the end of the day, sometimes a good left hook is a fighters, best, takedown, and a good body lock slam is a grappler's best knockout.
