I wondered the same thing...he made it known that they were part of the plan...the more compelling of the two reasons I could come up with is the vast improvement of his boxing made it a priority...people work on things between fights and sometimes fall in love with those particular skills....if I told you Andrei Arlovski was a world class grappler, would you believe me? Guy knocked someone out and it was kickboxing ever since....I think that's what happened to Aldo here....in truth, I don't think it would have made a difference...Max would have just countered the kicks