Paid Members Chunk Posted March 24, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 24, 2017 There were MMA style events pre-UFC, obviously Pancrase existed in Japan but that had a varying rule-set and Brazil had long since been hosting Vale Tudo events. Im not sure if there fights set in a cage before the UFC though. Cool, thanks. Wasn't obvious to me! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 24, 2017 Author Paid Members Share Posted March 24, 2017 yeh, Pancrase had been going before that, im not sure how much of it was legit though, the lines were always blurred in Pancrase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Chunk Posted March 24, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 24, 2017 yeh, Pancrase had been going before that, im not sure how much of it was legit though, the lines were always blurred in Pancrase. Just been reading a bit about it. Yeah, sounds like there were a good few worked fights in the early days there. Big John used to have a much more 'hands on' approach to refereeing! Tony Fryklund lands a few shots after the stoppage and Big John goes all protective-father-keep-your-hands-to-yourself-young-man on him! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted March 25, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 25, 2017 Yeah Big John had to be more hands on though in those Wild West early days of the UFC. There weren't as many rules and regulations and commissions and stuff in place back then so Big John was the law in there. He actually is responsible for introducing a few positive rule changes back then if I'm remembering right. At one point in the early days of the UFC the ref didn't even have the authority to stop a fight unless a fighter was out cold, tapping out or the corner threw the towel in. McCarthy got that changed so that refs would have the power to stop a fight at their discretion if they felt a fighter had had enough. McCarthy is the best referee in MMA history hands down for me. He's had the odd mistake here or there, in a 23 year career of course he has. But a Big John fuck up is a rare thing. There was a time when Dana was on the outs with McCarthy and the UFC (specifically Dana and Rogan) were pimping Herb Dean as the best ref in MMA but I was never on board with that. I like Herb Dean but I don't think it's even up for debate that McCarthy's had a better track record and been more reliable over a longer period than Herb. Is Big John in the UFC Hall of Fame yet? If not, why not? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 26, 2017 Author Paid Members Share Posted March 26, 2017 Someone like Big John probably couldn't be inducted until he's no longer active as a referee, not sure on that though. If you were to make a list of non-fighters who deserve their spot, Big John would be pretty high on there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted March 26, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 26, 2017 (edited) Joe Silva's surely going in as well. Wouldn't be surprised if he's inducted this year actually now he's finished up. That fucker's UFC run predates the Zuffa era, Dana, the Fertittas the lot. Could see him being put in around the time of the big July PPV. They always induct a bunch of names then. Edit - surely Hendo and Faber are good shouts for going in this year as well. Edited March 26, 2017 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted March 26, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 26, 2017 Bruce Prichard was saying on the Something To Wrestle podcast this week that in 1997 when they were signing Ken Shamrock, he was interested in bringing in Vitor Belfort to the WWF. Imagine that? Belfort was 19 then and jacked to the gills. You'd think he'd be exactly what Vince McMahon would be looking for back then. Or now really. Young, good looking, cartoon muscles, athletic. Bruce said the two main reasons they didn't get Belfort were 1) the language barrier and 2) Belfort and his people had no interest in doing "that fake stuff" or something. Has to be more of the latter, doesn't it? The language barrier can't be the reason because Belfort always spoke English. Granted he's never been the most entertaining speaker but his English was fluent even back then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimufctna24 Posted March 27, 2017 Share Posted March 27, 2017 My interest in current Pro Wrestling is non-existent. However, I do enjoy listening to clips of Prichard's podcast on Youtube. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Chunk Posted March 27, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 27, 2017 Yeah, McCarthy does and absolutely bang up job in there. Ok he's a big guy himself but considering he's putting himself between two men having a fight, he does an amazing job of maintaining authority. The fighters in those early days just do whatever he tells them to. He makes it look easy, but it really can't have been. In other news, where the fuck did Maurice Smith come from? Mark Coleman is looking like a killer that nobody will be able to touch and then before you know it a stand up guy makes his UFC debut and demolishes him. I love the wild swings back and forth at the moment between what works and what doesn't. The sport is really finding its feet and because it's so young it's just completely unpredictable. The obvious takeaway from UFC 14 is that strikers can compete with grapplers after all. But, more than that, it's a win for cardio. If you come into the cage jacked up like crazy, you best be ready to win within 5 minutes. Otherwise, as Coleman discovered, you're in big trouble when you get stood up and can't strike. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seanz25 Posted March 27, 2017 Share Posted March 27, 2017 For the history on MMA/UFC etc - I can't recommend Art Davie's book enough. Really insightful. https://www.amazon.co.uk/This-Legal-Inside-Story-Created/dp/0991275640 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noah Southworth Posted March 27, 2017 Share Posted March 27, 2017 Bruce said the two main reasons they didn't get Belfort were 1) the language barrier and 2) Belfort and his people had no interest in doing "that fake stuff" or something. Has to be more of the latter, doesn't it? The language barrier can't be the reason because Belfort always spoke English. Granted he's never been the most entertaining speaker but his English was fluent even back then. The Gracie’s, especially at that time, hated pro wrestling. They never wanted any part of it. It was only a few years earlier that UWF-I had tried to set up a match between Takada and Royce Gracie, which not only fell apart once UWF-I explained to Gracie what they wanted in return for paying him a big bunch of money, but led to the notorious incident involving Yoji Anjo and Rickson Gracie. What likely exasperated the bad feeling was that in September the previous year, Pedro Otavio had become the first Brazilian fighter in the modern (post-UFC/Pancrase) MMA era to ‘sell out’ and ‘take a dive’, in this case doing a submission job in a worked match to Keiji Muto. Otavio got tons of heat in Brazil for being seen to have sold out. Even today, the Gracie’s generally don’t like pro wrestling. When Daniel and Rolles Gracie worked in New Japan in 2014, most of the Gracie’s hated them for it. They saw it as selling out. With that said, you have to take what Prichard says with a huge grain of salt. Whilst it is possible that feelers were sent out to the Gracie’s, it was never going to get to the point for Vitor’s limited English to become an issue. Given their vehement hatred of pro wrestling, especially at that time, the Gracie’s would have turned the WWF down right away and told them they’re not interested and not to even bother. The Gracie’s aspirations for Vitor didn’t involve pro wrestling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 27, 2017 Author Paid Members Share Posted March 27, 2017 Yeah, McCarthy does and absolutely bang up job in there. Ok he's a big guy himself but considering he's putting himself between two men having a fight, he does an amazing job of maintaining authority. The fighters in those early days just do whatever he tells them to. He makes it look easy, but it really can't have been. In other news, where the fuck did Maurice Smith come from? Mark Coleman is looking like a killer that nobody will be able to touch and then before you know it a stand up guy makes his UFC debut and demolishes him. I love the wild swings back and forth at the moment between what works and what doesn't. The sport is really finding its feet and because it's so young it's just completely unpredictable. The obvious takeaway from UFC 14 is that strikers can compete with grapplers after all. But, more than that, it's a win for cardio. If you come into the cage jacked up like crazy, you best be ready to win within 5 minutes. Otherwise, as Coleman discovered, you're in big trouble when you get stood up and can't strike. Yeh Maurice Smith broke the mold. Mark Coleman was seen as unbeatable before that. Smith i dont think ever really possessed takedown defence, he just proved that if you could survice early against a juiced up wrestler then you had a chance down the stretch. Also, the importance of leg kicks came into play around that time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Chunk Posted March 30, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 30, 2017 Anyone know more about the reason Big John was dumped as exclusive referee at UFC 16? Was it in reaction to the bad call he made at UFC 15.5 in the Sakuraba fight? Sakuraba shot for a takedown on Silveira and Big John called it as a knockout. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 30, 2017 Author Paid Members Share Posted March 30, 2017 don't know about the UFC 16 situation. I've seen the Sakuraba fight though, that has to be the only fight in history that has been restarted after the ref has called it off surely? are there any others? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Chunk Posted March 30, 2017 Paid Members Share Posted March 30, 2017 (edited) don't know about the UFC 16 situation. I've seen the Sakuraba fight though, that has to be the only fight in history that has been restarted after the ref has called it off surely? are there any others? Technically I don't think it was restarted. I think the result of the first fight stood, but then they had a second fight later on in the night. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazushi_Sakuraba If you look there, actually it says that the first fight was recorded as a No Contest and then the second fight took place. Pretty sure on the UFC broadcast the commentary team say the result from the first fight stands. Might've been a mistake on their part or an over ruling at a later date. Edited March 30, 2017 by Chunk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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