no your missing what im saying .. cage can sit there and make smoke come to him easily by gettin a fast life lead which isnt that hard to do by doing something random like a shadow kick on start round or something unexpected like that is instant life lead then he can just sit there and wait. cage doesnt have to do shit smoke has to come in, not the other way around is what im saying and there isnt even much risk if you know how to dash block properly and read the smoke if you are pursuing him. on way smoke is gonna get you is with a b23 yolo on the way in which he prays he hit confirms to get a sb otherwise cage is gonna be in even if u cancel to smoke away he's gonna catch you. also anti airing which is an obv who would jump in on a smoke with his aa game up unless you are really good at spacing and baiting a failed aa with a deep jumpkick into nutpunch / pressure.. smoke is the one taking all the risk in this matchup imo. or should i say the riskier side of things. smoke doesnt want cage fucking near him due to d3 going under f3 / no armor etc etc. its a fucking bitch to get out of a solid solid cage's pressure with smoke unlike the other way around where he can just fucking ex nutpunch you anytime he feels like it if u wana try to pressure him for to long aka 2/3 mixups *and mixups meaning a d4 b2 d3 2 grab or something* (smoke has godlike pressure strings to keep ppl from armoring or ex nut punching out during this)
the match is still very winnable but i think your downplaying the match a tid bit. if the cage player plays the match correctly this match could certainly turn into a really hard match for smoke. it only gets easier imo for the cage player as the sets go on and he catches on to what shennanigans you do to scout for baiting and trapping you into endless mixups (lol f3 11f1 d3 sickmixups tehehe) i don't struggle with too many cages other then @
crosstalk now since hes played it so much with me and knows exactly how to go about it. but it's def tough when the cage player knows exactly what to do to make the smoke not able to play his roll he leads people to do.