New Fight Question

[Viscant]

It's impossible to argue that there in an element of chance/luck in a fight. I can think of 3-4 examples of fights off the top of my head where one guy had the fight won and the other guy landed a miracle knee or lucky punch and sucked out a win.
But people always tend to overestimate the puncher's chance. A puncher's chance isn't holding 72o against AA. A puncher's chance against an elite MMA fighter is holding a 2 and a community chest card. The element is luck on the ground is virtually zero. When a non-crosstrained standup fighter is said to have a "puncher's chance" against a vastly superior grappler, really he has A PUNCH's chance. Once range is closed, the ability to debilitate an attacker is reduced to almost nothing and once already on the ground in an advanced position (side mount, back mount, north/south, hell even half guard will do against a man untrained in ground fighting), the ability to debilitate is reduced even further.

So while I agree with you that there is an element of chance in any form of combat, it is greatly exaggerated and at best will account for maybe 1 match in 50 at the most.

[Blarg]

Whenever I think striking art, I admit I think of more than boxing. And I tend to think of boxing arguments in terms of a fuller range of striking possibilities. To me it's hard not to imagine an elbow, etc., in there. And it's hard not to remember the power of some people in southern gung fu styles, who can launch a man through the air with a one-inch or even non-inch punch(I've both seen and felt it numerous times). So when I think of a "puncher's chance," I think of two things -- for some people, a punch can have astonishing power, and second, one punch can set up any number of other things even if it doesn't result in a knock-out. I admit, though, that I don't think every boxer or gung fu man can do this. But since we are talking about really good guys, my thoughts naturally gravitate toward that.

I don't think fighting is as free of chance as you say. Quite the contrary. I have gotten through and landed on much better fighters, and gotten them in locks, too. Lucky me! Was I better than them? Oh hell no. But every dog has his day. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Likewise, in sparring sessions, I've had guys get through on me. Sometimes someone just moves a little weird and it throws you, or you're just mentally unfocussed that day, or he's the lucky dog that has his day.

Superior skill wins in the long term, but short term results don't reflect long term trends, just like in poker. In the short term, all kinds of things can happen. And they really do, all the time. I've seen countless guys get in on better guys sometimes. That's just life. Nobody out there is a superhero or some kind of flawless machine.

[John Kilduff]

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It's impossible to argue that there in an element of chance/luck in a fight.

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Two fighters of not greatly different skill levels and stats: the better fighter will almost always win? I don't think so. Usually win, yes, but not almost always.

The same holds true chess. If the gap is large enough then it can be considered a certain victory, but not so if the gap is not fairly large.

The better fighter or player will win more than he loses versus an opponent who is moderately worse. But if they play a series of games, there will still be some wins and losses on each side.

You may well argue that there is no luck in chess either. That's true in the abstract sense of the game, but not entirely true in the real world. And the slightly inferior player will still have a share of wins and draws against the slightly better opponent.

So while there may be very little luck or chance in the game or the fight itself taken abstractly, there will yet be variance in the results of any given single game if one player is not much superior to the other.

By the way, there has to be more luck in fighting than in chess, simply because it is partially a matter of luck if a blow lands squarely or slips slightly off due to the movements of the contestants. I'm not talking about deliberately dodging a blow, just the natural effect that hitting a moving object is less than certain in the quality of the impact. Sort of the way a baseball player hits the ball, even on an easy pitch. Some hits against easy fat pitches will be home runs and some will be fly balls and some will be grounders. Sometimes a punch in the face will hit squarely and other times it will glance off partially, simply due to the moving nature of fighting and the fact that humans are not perfect robots. So the "lucky punch" can happen, as can also the unlucky glancing punch that would have been a KO but now is just a bee sting.

[Blarg]

This is transparently true and is of the essence of fighting.

[Viscant]

By that post I meant that it's impossible to argue against luck. I realize now that it was poorly worded but context and the last paragraph of the post should point that out.

[John Kilduff]

[ QUOTE ]
By that post I meant that it's impossible to argue against luck. I realize now that it was poorly worded but context and the last paragraph of the post should point that out.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ah, OK, thanks.