He leaves his chin open
The first reason on this list is an important one. While Alvarez has only been knocked out once in his entire 28-fight MMA career, he has been known to fight a little too upright, leading to him catching some big shots on the chin that occasionally drop him.
He’s largely been able to recover quickly from the blows, but it won’t be as easy to do that in the talent-laden UFC lightweight division. At 30 years old, he’s still in his prime, yet he doesn’t want to jeopardize that by leaving himself open to any unnecessary shots.
Alvarez is going to have to greatly improve his striking defense if he wants to win UFC gold.
