Boxer vs MMA Fighter – Who would win a street fight?

A lot of people started wondering if the MMA fighters can beat boxers since MMA started to become more and more popular. As a person who trains mostly boxing and MMA sometimes, I was also really interested in the topic. So I did some research, spoke with people from both sides and here’s what I found out:

Boxer or MMA fighter who would win? If it’s a boxing match the boxer is most likely to win. But if it’s an MMA bout or a “street fight” with as little rules as possible the MMA fighter would beat the boxer pretty easily. That’s because the boxer isn’t trained to defend things such as takedowns, submission attempts, kicks, elbows or knees, while the MMA fighter knows how to defend punches – the only weapon of the boxer.

But even though the chances of the boxer to win are really small, he still can beat the MMA fighter if he can execute a proper gameplan.

In this article, I talk mainly about the skill side of both sports when comparing them. But in this one: Boxer vs MMA Fighter – Who would win a street fight? the focus is more on comparing the history and popularity of both sports. Check it out after you finish with this one.

Skills of an MMA Fighter

A lot of people will say – yeah, MMA fighters have a bigger variety of skills but a boxers punch harder, faster and more precise. What if they knock the MMA fighter before he gets in a clinch or takes them down?

Well, that may happen but if the MMA fighter knows the skillset of his opponent he’ll try to avoid that. If the MMA fighter is smart he would enter in a boxing exchange with a boxer.

He’ll most likely shoot from a low single-leg takedown from a distance (like what Khabib did against Conor McGregor in the first round) to avoid getting punched in the face while shooting.

Many MMA fighters are good at neutralizing good boxers in MMA. The best example of that is Khabib Nurmagomedov who uses his wrestling and pressure combined with fundamental boxing to make his opponents defend punches while he goes for a takedown. He fights at a high pace and never stays in boxing range for too long which makes it almost impossible for a boxer to knock him out.

So a guy like him is the worst possible matchup for a boxer in a street fight. Because he is already training to beat better boxers in the octagon. A fighter like Conor McGregor who uses primarily boxing may be an easier fight for a pro boxer because he fights in the boxer domain.

But still, even he isn’t stranger to wrestling and BJJ. Even a striker like him can look like an Olympic wrestler against someone who never wrestled before.

Boxer’s path the victory

MMA fighters have the overall advantage when it comes to streetfight but that doesn’t mean the boxer can’t win. The chances aren’t that big but that may happen if the MMA fighter makes a mistake. For example, staying in a boxing range for too long or getting countered by a punch while kicking.

Here are some advantages the boxers have over the most MMA fighters.

1. More punching power – The boxers spend all of their time of training to develop great punching technique, while the MMA fighters focus also on Muay Thai, Wrestling or BJJ. That means the boxers have a much better punching technique. And the better technique equals more power.
2. Better hand speed – Boxers muscles are much more used to the punches, so their shots are much faster.
3. Better footwork – Boxing has the best footwork of all combat sports. Boxers can move in-and-out laterally or they can create great angles to attack. In other sports, for example, Karate or Taekwondo, people use only in-and-out movement, while in Muay Thai, the footwork is almost non-existent.
4. Better boxing defense – Boxers can slip punches, block them, parry them or roll with the punches much more effective than MMA fighters.
5. Better jab – The most important punch in boxing is the jab. It can help you keep your opponent at a distance, or set up bigger punches. And that will be the main weapon of the boxer when fighting against an MMA fighter. If he manages to catch him with some hard jabs and then move away, so the MMA fighter can’t grab him and take him down, eventually, the damage will accumulate and the MMA guy won’t be able to take more punches.
6. Better cardio on the feet – The longest boxing bouts are 12 rounds, 3 minutes each while the longest MMA fights – 5 rounds, 5 minutes each. That means the boxers train to fight 11 minutes more than the MMA fighters which can help them in the fight. That cardio goes out of the window if the fight goes to the ground. If you never wrestled or rolled with BJJ practitioners you’ll gas out pretty quickly no matter how good of cardio you have on the feet.

If a boxer can keep the MMA fighter at arms-length, using his jab, and then his footwork to circle away when the MMA fighter shouts for a takedown, he could potentially win by landing clean hits and eventually finish the fight by KO/TKO.

MMA Fighter’s Path to the Victory

Obviously to stand and box with the boxer isn’t the smartest gameplan if you’re an MMA fighter. So there are 2 options:

1. Takedown and submission – The path with the less resistance for the MMA fighter will be to take the fight to the ground. The best way to do it is to duck under the boxers punches when his attacking and to grab his legs for a double or single leg takedown. The MMA fighter can also get into a clinch and take the fight to the ground from there.

Then he can do a variety of things – use some ground and pound, choke the boxer out, use an armbar holds etc. Boxer will have no idea how to defend himself on the ground, which will be an easy day in the office for the MMA guy. That exact scenario happened in the fight between Randy Couture and James Toney inside the octagon.

1. Leg kicks – the boxing stance is a little sideways, which isn’t great for defending leg kicks. When fighting an MMA fighter, his legs will get worked. Kicks will be happening over and over again to the same spot to a point where standing on that leg is almost impossible.

That will decrease the power of the punches of the boxer because he won’t be able to stand stable and also his footwork will suffer. That’s how the MMA fighter can weaken an opponent before coming in for the kill.

However, this strategy is for the MMA fighter because he can get countered with a punch over the top while he is kicking his opponent’s leg and get knocked out. Many MMA, kickboxing bouts finished that way.

Depending on the skill of the boxer, he might be able to fight the MMA fighter off for a while, if they can keep the fight on their feet. But it will be really hard for him to keep the right distance.

If the boxers stay too far away, he’ll find himself into the kicking range of the MMA fighter. And if he’s too close – the MMA fighter will grab him and take him down easily. On the ground, he will lose his punching power and with no ground game skills, the boxer is done.

If you want to increase your punching power, I highly recommend checking out this: Punching power tips – Free PDF file

When an MMA Fighter Challenges a Pro Boxer

Now, unless you have lived under a rock for the last five years, you must have heard of or watched the Floyd Mayweather Jr VS Connor McGregor boxing match.

Here is an example of two fighters at the top of their game in boxing and MMA. Connor thought he could beat the 49-0 (before the fight) boxing champion because of his own boxing skills which, to be honest, in the MMA, Connor was a really good boxer.

I think he thought he could beat him because of the confidence he had in his own fighting abilities. In the boxing ring with Floyd, however, he just couldn’t weather the storm and lost, improving Mayweather’s record to 50-0 which is the first time in boxing history that anyone reached that incredible fighting record!

When a Boxer Challenges an MMA Fighter

Nowadays there are plenty of MMA fighters with a boxing background – Alexander Gustafsson, Conor McGregor, Max Holloway etc. But we can’t say they are pure boxers because they also learned kicking, wrestling, BJJ and Muay Thai before starting to compete in MMA.

But if you want to see a pure boxer with a little to none training in other martial arts fighting in the octagon I suggest watching James Toney vs Randy Couture.

James Toney was one of the best (if not the best) defensive heavyweight boxers. But as he stepped inside the octagon against one of the all-time greats MMA fighters in Randy Couture (background in Greco-Roman wrestling).

Randy’s gameplan was clear – to take the boxer down and to submit him. He was at first hesitant to close the distance but then he fainted a punch to the face to make Toney bring his hands up and then he went for a takedown.

At that point, the fight was pretty much over since Toney has zero experience on the ground:

What if all Rules were taken off the Table? [Street Fight Time]

I think most people would be interested in seeing what happens in this instance. A bare-knuckle brawl without any rules. Boxer vs MMA fighter, who you going to pick?

I think most people would pick the MMA fighter to beat the boxer, easily. As much as I agree with that decision, I don’t think it’s the right one every time.

Of course, the MMA fighter will well versed in different martial arts as well the fighter could be stronger overall, as they train more muscles throughout the body to excel in their respective sport. But there is the old saying. “All it takes is one punch”.

You just never know when a fighter will be caught off-guard and knock-out, whether in the ring, octagon or on the street.  

Conclusion

If you want to train for self-defense, I would suggest starting MMA. It gives you much more variety of weapons than boxing. But even if you train MMA, focus on your boxing. Boxing is a big part of the MMA. Most of the finishes are caused by punches and boxing is the sport that will teach you the best how to throw and defend punches.

Which sport you prefer boxing or MMA, let me know in the comments below!