What?Not exactly. He defended against the dude's attacks while trying to explain himself. The moment the enemy ignored your pleas and attacked you, that's the moment you use your most potent weapons to defeat and immobilize him. Then talk again.
I mean, I'm rewatching that part just now... it's *exactly* how I explained it and how you would have done it. Even the "trying to talk it out about twice before going with sheer force"
They talked, Spear attacked, he told him to calm down, didn't work -> they fought -> he won -> he told him again to calm the fuck down -> he rescued his ass.
Let's please not nitpick on wether he should've done it one attempt earlier or not.
The lightning cage pretty much started the arena fight - involving all participants in this battle, before Spear attacked, Naofumi asked him one last time to stop that nonsense. The first attack was made and then they fought until spear got defeated, without further talk about stopping it.