The 'Today I Learned...' MMA Thread

[jimufctna24]

Similar to Wand and Ebb, Palling was a fighter I would occasionally come across while scanning the Sherdog Fight Finder in the mid-2000s. I don't think I ever viewed any of his fights. and I certainly had no idea he was related to Holloway.  It's interesting to consider the notable fighters Palling fought, and the stage of their career they were at when Palling fought them. Also, what those fighters would go on to become after fighting Palling. 

Gomi in 1999: I haven't seen much of Gomi's early MMA career. However, from what I've read, Gomi was a ground and pound merchant in his early fights, and wouldn't develop his boxing until much later into the 2000s after his losses to Penn and Hansen. 

Din Thomas in 2001: Thomas was about to debut in the UFC. He was also fresh off a win over Pulver which would age beautifully given the run Pulver would then go on between late 2000 and early 2003. Thomas would go on to compete against numerous world class lightweights throughout the 2000s, winning some, losing some. 

Kid Yamamoto in 2002: I struggled to gain access to K1 Hero's shows at the time, so much of the following information is derived from what Slack has written about Yamamoto over the years. After the loss to Palling in 2002, Yamamoto would go on a legendary 5 year run, which included battering much bigger men in the 2005 K1 Hero's GP,  running Masato close in a kickboxing bout, the famous flying knockout over Miyata, and then battering Rani Yahya. Yamamoto was one of the great freak talents on his era, with incredible speed, strength and power. He's an example of a fighter that, if around today and in the right camp, would have the potential be molded into a GOAT contender. 

Gilbert Melendez in 2003: My first exposure to Melendez came in 2006 when he debuted in Strikeforce and then Price FC. By that point, Melendez was clearly a world class lightweight, as evidenced by his wins over Guida and Kawajari. I have no idea how good Melendez was in 2003, but given he was barely out of his teens, I assume he was at the very early stages of his development. 

Jens Pulver in 2004: Pulver was still on his hiatus from the big leagues when he fought Palling. Since leaving the UFC as their Lightweight champion in 2002, Pulver had actually suffered two losses on the smaller shows. His loss to Ludwig in early 2003 was the most memorable, as Ludwig stopped Pulver with strikes after just over a minute of fighting (Bas Rutten often brings up this fight, as he was in Ludwig's corner). By the time Pulver fought and beat Palling in mid-2004, he had somewhat recovered from that loss, notching up multiple wins throughout the rest of 03 and early 04. However, Pulver was then knocked in his Pride debut against a by then fully developed and surging Gomi. 

All in all, that's a pretty impressive and interesting list of fighters that Palling fought, even if none of them, with the possible exception of Pulver, were at their best when Palling fought them.

Edited August 6 by jimufctna24

[wandshogun09]

Nice one Jimbo. I didn’t delve much into the context of where those guys were at in their careers when Palling fought them, cheers for filling in some gaps. You’ve also reminded me that Gilbert Melendez actually had a cup of coffee in Pride, which I’d completely forgotten about! 

I didn’t get to see the K1 Hero’s stuff until years later when I finally managed to get the full DVD sets of the 2005, 2006 and 2007 GPs, plus the Dynamite shows from those years. Can’t even remember the name of the site I got them off now but it was UK based and the official DVDs were all on there. Probably would’ve been around 2008/09 when I got that lot and, in those days when I was single, before I had kids and when we never had nearly as much MMA to watch weekly, I binged the lot of those Hero’s DVDs in shockingly quick time. Like you say, there’s a lot of KID’s prime stuff on those shows and, while I was aware of him and liked the bits I’d seen, I don’t think I fully appreciated him until I saw that stuff. They were really good shows on the whole. Not quite the magic of Pride but what else was? 

[jimufctna24]

15 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

 

I didn’t get to see the K1 Hero’s stuff until years later when I finally managed to get the full DVD sets of the 2005, 2006 and 2007 GPs, plus the Dynamite shows from those years. Can’t even remember the name of the site I got them off now but it was UK based and the official DVDs were all on there. Probably would’ve been around 2008/09 when I got that lot and, in those days when I was single, before I had kids and when we never had nearly as much MMA to watch weekly, I binged the lot of those Hero’s DVDs in shockingly quick time.

That makes sense. 

From what I recall, the early Hero's shows started popping up in HMV in around 2007. I've just checked my DVD storage and I still have the 2005 Dynamite NYE show, which features Yamamoto vs Sudo. I also still have a DVD of their first show, headlined by Bob Sapp. However, from what I recall, it was difficult to gain access to Hero's shows immediately after they occurred. And even if you were able to access a video of their recent shows, they didn't have English commentary. Although I seem to recall you disliked the dude who provided colour commentary in English for the DVDs they later released. After a quick Google search, I assume that was Pierre Guillet? 

16 hours ago, wandshogun09 said:

Like you say, there’s a lot of KID’s prime stuff on those shows and, while I was aware of him and liked the bits I’d seen, I don’t think I fully appreciated him until I saw that stuff. They were really good shows on the whole. Not quite the magic of Pride but what else was? 

Sadly, I saw Hero's as a bit of an annoyance in the mid to late 2000s. The difficulty I had accessing their shows meant it was in my interest for the promotion to fail, and the good fighters they had to appear on shows I could access easier. Obviously, I view things differently now. 

As I understand it, Yamamoto was still in his prime in late 2007 when he beat Yahya. However, Yamamoto then injured his knee and didn't fight for 18 months. When he returned in mid-2009, fighting for Dream as Hero's had been discontinued by that point, his speed and chin had diminished greatly and he was never the same fighter again. So aye, Yamamoto's best stuff in MMA almost came exclusively in K1. 

I'm tempted to go back and watch his best fights as I did with Fedor a few years back. 

[wandshogun09]

2 hours ago, jimufctna24 said:

Although I seem to recall you disliked the dude who provided colour commentary in English for the DVDs they later released. After a quick Google search, I assume that was Pierre Guillet? 

Ah Christ yeah. He was rotten. Haven’t seen those shows in years but I remember at the time thinking he was on the same level as Damon ‘The Dawg’ Perry in his shitness. So that tells you how much I couldn’t stand him. 

[Egg Shen]

Yeah, i think the commentary was dubbed on in English after the fact too (similar to old Pride shows), you can always tell the difference. Guillet was the shits.

[wandshogun09]

Yeah on the early Pride shows the Quadros and Rutten commentary was clearly dubbed in after the fact. Tickled me on the one show when they were doing that and Bas appeared on screen working Mark Kerr’s corner while supposedly also somehow still sat at the commentary desk.

Can’t remember exactly when the proper commentary started in Pride. I know Pride 10 had it because that was Quadros and Eddie Bravo and they were clearly there at the Tokyo Dome during the show opening. But I’m not sure if every show from then on had live commentary or not. Maybe the 2000 GP was the start. 

Edited August 10 by wandshogun09

[TibBo]

UFC paying 70 million for Pride is a terrible business decision in retrospect.

Pride had already lost the TV deal I believe, so they probably would have got the fighters anyway eventually…
They didn’t get Fedor, and of the fighters they did get:

Minotauro got tko’d by Mir for the Interim title.
Shogun gassed against Griffin.
Pre-Hendobomb Hendo lost to Rampage in the title unification fight.
Rampage then immediately lost the title to Griffin.
Crocop got Gonzaga’d.
Wand lost to Chuck (in a great fight to be fair).
Werdum lost to Arlovski.

The only good thing to really come out of it was the amazing UFC Undisputed game with the Pride mode by THQ, and UFC then gave the license to EA…

[Egg Shen]

Seeing most of the Pride fighters come in and tank initially was probably the saddest point of my MMA fandom

[jimufctna24]

I remember tracking how the Pride fighters fared in the UFC a few years ago. 

From what I recall, they actually fared pretty well against their UFC counterparts, for which I mean fighters who were competing in the UFC in the early to mid 2000s. As examples, Barnett battered Mir, Shogun beat Liddell and Vera, Hendo beat Franklin and Bisping, Lil Nog beat Ortiz and Rashad, Big Nog beat Slyvia and Couture, Werdum beat Vera and Gonzaga, Rampage beat Liddell and Jardine, Herring beat Kongo and Imes, Cro Cop beat Sanchez, etc. You can also add Fedor battering Arlovski and Sylvia, even though those bouts occurred outside of the UFC. 

Of course, the Pride fighters did take losses too, Liddell beat Wanderlei, Mir beat Cro Cop and Big Nog, Arlovski beat Werdum, Griffin beat Rampage, Gonzaga beat Cro Cop, Kongo beat Cro Cop, Rashad beat Rampage and Hendo, O'Brien beat Herring, etc, but for the most part the Pride fighters prevailed against their UFC counterparts. 

Where the Pride fighters really struggled was against the younger and emerging UFC talent. Jones beat Shogun and Rampage, Bader beat Little Nog and Rampage, Cain beat Big Nog, JDS beat Werdum and Cro Cop, etc, etc. 

So it was really an age/generational shift that was occurring.