Opinion: Joshua Van Is Doing Everything Right

Among the fights that got lost in the shuffle of a highly successful UFC 316 card was Joshua Van putting a brutal beatdown upon a game Bruno Silva. Already a favorite of MMA talking heads, Van established himself as the most likely future UFC champion of anyone who was sitting outside the top ten the official UFC rankings within their respective divisions. He hurt the durable “Bulldog” on several occasions but never went crazy looking for the kill. It was a mature performance that belied his youthful 23 years upon this earth. Even more impactful, it belied the less than four years in which Van has been a professional MMA fighter.

For those who have been watching Van’s career, it really isn’t that much of a surprise that he has improved by leaps and bounds since making his UFC debut in June of 2023, just two years ago. Even at that point, Van was an impressive prospect. His striking technique was brilliant, already rivaling the best strikers in the division. There were rough edges for sure. Van was slow to make reads and had some large defensive deficiencies. Those aspects aren’t surprising given his youth, but there were even some positives within those holes. While he was slow to make reads, he did make reads, which is why he so often got stronger as the fight progressed, proving to be at his best in the third round time and again.

While those are the aspects that made Van a prospect to keep an eye on, Van has also managed to move up the ladder far more quickly than anyone expected. The funny thing is it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out why Van has managed to become a problem in such a short amount of time. He fights as often as he can.

There is no better way to learn how to do something than to do it. That may sound stupidly obvious, but that’s something that seems to be forgotten. So many prospects are in a major rush to get to the UFC and when they finally get to the big show, they tend to fight only one or two times a year. For an old vet whose body requires more recovery time, it makes sense to run a limited schedule. But for someone who has so much more to learn – like a prospect – nothing can replace the experience gained by stepping into the cage as much as possible.

That isn’t to say there isn’t anything to training or sparring. Obviously, it’s a necessary field to learn and refine new tactics. Sparring and grappling sessions are also great for helping to get comfortable with the tactics. But ask Buzz Aldrin if going to space was different from training to go out to space. Hitting a spinning backfist at partial speed is different than letting it fly at full speed. Hitting a reversal in grappling is different when there’s nothing hold your opponent back from wanting to hold you down. When your opponent’s goal is to hurt you, they’re going to go all out to keep you down. The same can’t be said of a teammate while training... provided your teammate is a good teammate.

Along those lines, while we’d all agree it was folly in the early days of MMA for teammates to not hold back in training, the track record also shows there was something to it. The Lion’s Den was one of the best gyms in MMA’s early days and they beat the crap out of each other in the gym, figuring out what works best in the process. The same could be said of Miletich Fighting Systems, a camp that arguably held three of the four championship belts in the UFC in 2006. Granted, they didn’t hold any belts come the spring of 2007 – and never regained a title – but that was a camp notorious for not holding back in training. In the process, they were ahead of the curve, for a while at least.

Don’t think I’m advocating hard sparring. I’m advocating for experience. Hard sparring can be a form of that, but taking as many fights as one can get is a much better way to gain experience. Van has done just that, his victory over Silva proving to be his eighth UFC contest in just two years. There’s something to be said for fighting at that pace. It creates less space in between fights, making it less likely to forget lessons learned the hard way. It allows for more learning opportunities. Hell, even fighting hurt is a learning experience as one develops a better understanding of their limitations. Fighting frequently when young is also beneficial given the body heals faster when younger. Making reads becomes easier too. Just look at how quickly Van found his stride against Silva. That isn’t by accident.

There’s no doubt Van’s relative inexperience has something to do with his expedited rise. The less one knows, the more they can learn, and faster they do so to begin with. But Van’s rise has been exceptional as we’ve been able to see his progress in such a short time. Along those lines, Van’s frequent appearances have kept him in the minds of fans too. He hasn’t given them a chance to forget who he is. Given there’s a wide berth of fighters on the roster whom the majority fight fans don’t recognize, Van has solved a major problem facing many fighters: fight fans know who he is. Even though some saw Van’s win over Silva as something of a breakthrough, Van is still taking every opportunity possible. He has already agreed to step in on short notice to face Brandon Royval at UFC 317, just three weeks after his fight with Silva. A solid argument could be made that Royval is the best flyweight in the world this side of Alexandre Pantoja—and I’ve already heard some express that they’ll be picking Van to win.

The bottom line is: Van gets it. Fighting frequently solves many of the issues that plague younger fighters. Van’s natural talents have allowed him to make the UFC not just a proving ground, but a learning ground as well. For some, it would probably be better to load up on the experience on the regionals, but the experience is something that young fighters aren’t loading up on the way they did in the past. Whether that’s fighters being unable to find opponents or pulling out for every minor injury I can’t say, but young fighters would do well to load up on experience as much as possible, even if that means stepping in on short notice. Look what it has done for Van.