Ben Askren and Jorge Masvidal Relive the Five-Second Knockout

Few moments in mixed martial arts are replayed as often as the flying knee Jorge Masvidal landed on Ben Askren at UFC 239. It took just five seconds: Masvidal sprinted across the cage, connected flush on Askren's chin and ended the fight on the spot. Now the two men have revisited that night together, and they did it as friends.

The pair once genuinely disliked each other. That changed after Askren suffered a life-threatening illness last year, when Masvidal reached out to mend fences. With the feud behind them, they sat down on Full Send MMA to look back on the rivalry and the knockout with a new kind of respect.

Askren: I misread the trajectory

Askren admitted he never saw the strike coming. He said a flying knee had never worried him, because fighters usually throw it from close range and come almost straight up. Masvidal's version followed a running, jumping path, and Askren believes his brain simply misjudged the angle. He said he could not think of anyone before Masvidal who had thrown the technique that way. "I couldn't predict it," Askren said, explaining that his brain built a prediction pattern from what it expected and got it wrong.

Masvidal: built from studying the wrestler

Masvidal explained how the idea took shape. He said he picks up striking almost by sight, but wrestling is something he has to ask about and feel. Watching Askren's fights, he noticed that whenever Askren ended up at a range he did not like, he would shoot or look for a clinch, a two-on-one, an underhook or a single leg. Masvidal decided to change speed and close the distance suddenly, so that he would be ready for the takedown attempt instead of being stuck defending it.

He said the last thing he wanted was to spend the fight fending off a single leg from someone who had been in that position hundreds of thousands of times. Even if he were winning a scramble, he knew that would be a bad place to be. The plan worked better than either man could have imagined, and the knockout turned Masvidal into a full-blown UFC star.