Introduction
Saturday, November 10th, American bantamweight prospect Patrick Mix will be in action for the King of the Cage card. He will be competing against veteran Keith Richardson, as Mix looks to keep his 135-pound title. Mix represents the WNY MMA & Fitness, as well as Jackson-Winklejohn MMA. Let’s take a closer look at this prospect as this week’s “Prospect Spotlight.”
Strengths
Submissions: Watch any Patrick Mix fight and you’ll see that he’s a fantastic grappler with excellent submission ability. Five of his eight professional wins come via tapout, four of which come via rear-naked choke. He does have solid ground striking that helps set that up, but his positional grappling is really what secures him submission attempts. Not only that, but the 25-year-old champ had numerous submission wins as an amateur, and was also an amateur national champion in MMA. His two biggest wins came via submission, tapping out now-UFC roster member Andre Ewell with a rear-naked choke and top east coast regional prospect Tony Gravely with a quick, nasty guillotine choke.
Size: For a 135-pounder, Mix is a very big fighter. He is 5’11”, which is far taller than your average bantamweight. Not only that, but he has very long arms and legs, which are perfect for a guy with his fighting style, as long limbs are good for chokes. What’s crazy is he used to fight at flyweight, 10 pounds below where he fights now. However, he’s gotten older and added on some more muscle, likely making that cut much tougher. His size is a natural advantage for any man he steps in the cage with.
Needs Improvement
More Complete Striking: There aren’t many glaring weaknesses I see in Mix thus far, other than the fact his striking can be a little more refined than it is. Going to Jackson-Winklejohn will definitely help him there. He’s not a bad striker, but it tends to be more on the grounds of basic techniques and using his strikes to set up takedowns to this point in his career. If he puts some more diversity into this striking, as well as some power with that technique, he will become much more dangerous than he already is. He had a couple knockouts as an amateur, but those had a lot to do with ground-and-pound.
Outlook
Top-25 UFC Bantamweight: I’m not sold yet on Patrick Mix being a UFC title contender or champion, but he definitely has the chops to stick around the company for a long time. He has the skills of a top-25 bantamweight in the UFC, assuming the UFC doesn’t fold the flyweight division and move all the fighters up to 135. That would really crowd an already crowded division. That said, Mix has made great strides from fight to fight, and he’s just 25 years old right now. That means his best days are ahead of him. Seeing where he is right now and how his ceiling is very high, expect Mix wearing UFC gear sooner than later. He has the talent and the exciting skill set to keep the audience alive.
MMA Intel 