that stuff isnt basic when you have frank mir under you. you'll find in mma, a lot comes down to mastery of the basics anyway. and a combination of conditioning, timing, and relevant experience trumps technique or kata. and rolling has little in common with being in guard and having punches/elbows flying at your head, or back at you for that matter. or the looming threat of getting slammed on your head. pounding frank mir into submission requires skill. skill in your conditioning, skill in your game, skill on top of hard work, preparation and god given ability. the fact that he simply got Mir down and into half guard required a tremendous amount of skill. that wrestling skill which keeps getting glossed over. look quick or you may miss it. getting people down is frank mir's thing. grappling is his strength. frank mir has been mistakenly made out to be some sort of "decent" striker in this conversation, which really isnt the case. he's a submission guy, with his last win against an over-ripe Nog, making him look to be Sugar Ray Leonard reincarnate. Mir is not a striker. he's a ground guy, who got out-grounded and pounded. he got steamrolled by a guy with serious athletic ability and enough skill to keep you on the ground for 25 minutes if need be. skill enough to win in this sport. you watch bobby lashley make some serious noise too. that dude is a brute who will ground out a lot of wins in this sport. you cant under-estimate wrestling. wrestling is the wild-card that made both Rampage and Chuck Lidell awesome fighters, despite their exciting style. it was Tito's bread and butter when he was good. scores of successful fighters have it on their resume. and brock making a win look easy, doesnt mean its not there. he now has wins over Randy Couture, Heath Herring, and Frank Mir. Thats a serious list of seasoned, terrific fighters.
We'll just have to agree to disagree. I find that when you're substantially bigger and stronger you can get by with much less skill. I sparred a guy today who outweighed me by about 40 lbs. His skill as a stand-up guy is fairly limited. This guy's strategy was to charge often. Most of the guys that were smaller than him, he overwhelmed. I am significantly faster and have pretty good defense so he was less successful against me. But if he were as quick (or quicker) than me and just went for the tackle, I don't know that I could have stopped him. It's even easier in the ground game. Size and strength really minimize the skill requirements. I can manage against bigger guys b/c I'm usually quicker and have good defensive skills. But when I face guys with similar quickness and give up size and strength as well it's considerably easier for them to stay on top. Lesner is a good athlete so he has balance. That's why he stays on top. That's athletic ability but it's not technical wrestling skill.
I don't hate Brock either. My only problem is, and always has been his rise up the rankings all due to his name and recognition from the WWE. The guy got a title fight in his 3rd UFC match. He was 2-1 in the UFC when he got that title shot. After he lost to Mir, he beat Heath Herring and leapfrogged all of the top ranked UFC heavyweights to set up the match against Couture. He made the most of his chance by beating Couture, and now Mir. I just still resent the fact that he got to bypass alot of guys. I feel like its a slap to the face of the guys who have working their asses off like Kongo, Carwin, Velazquez, even Gabriel Gonzaga. Now I'll just wait and see if the same happens to Kimbo if he happens to become a decent fighter on TUF.
Look at what you can buy at the UFC Store!!!!!!! http://ufcstore.seenon.com/detail.php?p=104320&v=ufc_ufc_collectibles_championship-belts UN REAL! They also have Autographed Fight Posters. I am getting the Hughes/Penn for $149.99 and putting that in my home bar. TOO cool. I am itching...and I mean itching to buy that belt. How cool would it be to have it framed in my lounge?
That is a fair complaint. But at the same time, it's hard to argue against it when he's already the champion and has successfully defended the title. He's avenged his only loss, in dominant fashion. A loss in which he was also dominating. All of the guys you mentioned, we're sitting here wondering if they can beat Brock. Not the other way around. THAT is the gravitas of a champion.
but what about all those silly "its not the size of the dog in the fight mantras"! i too think size completely makes a difference, if it didnt, there wouldnt be weight classes. i just think Brock has had a lot of credit taken away from him here. there are tons of TUF contestants who walk on and succeed on that show with ncaa wrestling pedigrees with a year or less mma training under their belt. brocks next 5 fights arent going to prove either of us right. theyre always going to be a little sloppy, on the ground, and with an aura of that wrastlin. agree to disagree tho.
I'm not trying to take any credit away from Lesner. He won those fights. He just didn't display well rounded fighting skills while doing it. My argument has never been that he isn't good. My argument is simply that he's not a well rounded fighter.
but there is alot of non well rounded fighters that succeeded very well in ufc.....chuck liddell being the most aparent case.....
lidell actually has solid ground skills through a great amateur wrestling background. he just not a submission guy. theres really only a handful of fighters who are really well rounded and "great" at striking, wrestling, and submissions. lesnar is well rounded for a heavyweight. i cant really think of any heavyweights except for Fedor who are great at striking and the ground game. GSP is a well rounded fighter, yet his stand-up isnt phenomenal. anderson silva's ground game isnt considered superb, yet he's a bjj black-belt. lesnar is growing savvy against subs, and thats kind of propeling his game into a similar place as rampage and lidell. good wrestlers, with better than average stand-up within their weight-class.
Penn is well rounded, and I would argue that GSPs stand up is phenomenal. He out pointed Alves standing up, though he won the fight with take downs. I hope Fedor comes the the UFC before his skills drop with age. Lesnar needs someone to push him, and I don't know who that would be at this point.
Chuck might win most his fights by strikes, but hes not exactly one diminsional. he has excellent take down defense, great kicks, and great hands. hes OK on the ground as well, just likes to KO everyone. to bad his jaw is glass
He's old and has a ton of miles, man. He certainly didn't start off with that glass jaw. Time catches up with everyone.
well i said a few pages ago......kickboxing is his main strength......witch takes care of the striking kicks and hands.......i will agree though his take down defense is insanely good
Especially with brawlers. Him, Wanderlei. Nog has been in plenty battles and it caugh up with him. It will catch up with everybody if you fight long enough.
Yep, thats just how it works. I look at it like every fighter has a number of hard shots that they can take when they start their career. As time goes on, the number dwindles until it's completely gone and they can be KOd on 1 hard shot. That's where Liddel and Nog are now, IMO.
Well, Lidell is definetly done, while im curious to see the couture/nog fight. Nog has a heart of a champ, so well see. Even tho at least, age alone, should slow him down.
Tito Back in UFC? http://www.mmaweekly.com/absolutenm/templates/dailynews.asp?articleid=9181&zoneid=2 Thoughts?
i think they should both come out of the closet finally... seriously, those two are like the drama couple in every high school in America.
IMO, Randy is one of the more overrated fighters. I have nothing against the guy, good for him, but I just never understood the hype about him. Besides the fact that he was old when he was the champ.
I would consider Liddell to be less one-dimensional than Lesner. That being said, I never liked Liddell much either b/c I never thought he was very well rounded. I prefer to watch fighters who are well rounded and demonstrate great skill. My favorite guys to watch are GSP, Silva and even Penn (though I think he's an ***). A guy like Lesner simply hasn't shown me enough to entice me to spend PPV dollars on.
Randy throughout his career, toppled heavyweights and light heavyweights at their peak. he, on many occasions, was the guy who made the unstoppable force humble. off the top of my head: Vitor Belfort when he was unbeaten and unstoppable. Tito Ortiz when he WAS mma. Lidell during his reign at 205 supremacy Tim Sylvia after he put away Arlovski and all other heavy weight competition. Gabe Gonzaga after he near decapitated Cro-Cop.
Once again, Fedor's translator blows one. http://www.mmanews.com/other/Fedor:-The-UFC-Doesnt-Treat-Fighers-Like-People.html Fedor never said anything about UFC not treating fighters like people. He just said "I will fight for UFC if the contract won't be one sided" IMO affliction gave him some dumbass, who can't speak Russian on purpose.
