It’s hard to dispute the claim that the striking in MMA is at the best place it has ever been, as its development has exceeded the pace of the overall technical development of the entire sport; while MMA has always been marked by cream-of-the-crop grapplers and wrestlers from the strongest backgrounds available, the striking had been woefully subpar for a large part of early development.
A large part of it had been the money in MMA, as the best boxers went to the more lucrative sweet science; another large part has just been what MMA entails, as the kickboxers could thrive in GLORY without the need to worry about wrestling. As such, fighters like Anderson Silva could feast for a decade upon top contenders whose best striking artifice was running forward with 1-2s.
As strikers like Michael Bisping (Parillo’s Bisping, at least) and Chris Weidman came to beat the man once known as the pinnacle of striking in the sport, the true potential skill of MMA striking became ever clearer.