MMA Unpopular Opinions

[wandshogun09]

@jimufctna24 I'll concede to all of that. Thinking about it more and especially after reading your post, I'd still have Fedor at #1. I think if Stipe had beaten DC though, I might've had him just pipping it. 

@Carbomb I think what made Cain so great is that he blended his striking and wrestling together seamlessly like you rarely see at heavyweight. It didn't always look pretty but it worked because his opponents never knew when he was going to grapple or strike. The JDS fights are the best example of this. JDS had been in with, and battered, better pure strikers than Cain. He'd stopped Cro Cop, Yvel and took Shane Carwin's punches without so much as flinching. Yet Cain was able to drop him and hurt him a bunch of times. There's something to be said for that. I think JDS was spooked by Cain's wrestling, and Cain had him thinking about that and defending the legs, which disguised the bombs that were coming up top. Cain was really good about that confused chaos style of fighting. Where it didn't work though, was against Werdum. People harped on the altitude excuse and I'm not saying it didn't play a part at all. But what Werdum had that all of Cain's previous opponents maybe lacked, is that he had zero fear of Cain's wrestling because he had the confidence of the safety net of having the most lethal guard in the division. This allowed him to let his strikes fly freely. He was doing well way before Cardio Cain gassed. It wasn't just the altitude. Werdum spanked him so bad on the feet that Cain's corner were telling him between rounds to take Werdum down. Says it all. When your corner thinks you have to take down a BJJ world champion with a killer guard to win, you know it really isn't going well in the standup. 

Cain was/is a fantastic fighter. His combination of his timing, pace, relentlessness, wrestling and boxing is a bastard for anyone to face. But I think a lot of people who rate Cain as the heavyweight GOAT often base it on what they think he could've done and what he was capable of, rather than what he actually did. That's not how it works. I could've bought a mansion abroad if I won the Euromillions but it never happened so I'm still slumming it in a semi in the favelas of Birmingham. Unless Cain actually comes back and does something, he'll continue to get left behind. He can't live off the fumes of the 2 JDS wins forever. 

[David]

I'm as big a fan of Fedor as anyone, but to still consider him the greatest heavyweight of all time is a bit ridiculous in my book. He's lucky if he's in the top three in my opinion. The guy was 33 years old when he lost to Werdum and went on that 3 fight slide. People talk as if he was past his best, an ageing fighter by that time, which he wasn't.

He was beating on chumps like Zuluzinho, Matt Lindland and Hong Man Choi when he was supposed to be in his prime (29 - 31).

Truth is, and hardcore fans don't like to hear this, he most likely was never that great to begin with. He was the heavyweight Royce Gracie back in the day.

He beat Cro Cop. 

Cro Cop, who lost to Gabe Gonzaga and Cheick fucking Kongo. Again, people look back and assume he was past his best by this point, but he was 32 years old when he faced Gonzaga.

His UFC record was 5-6, with "big" wins over the likes of Eddie Sanchez, Mostapha Al-Turk and Pat Barry.

Every time he faced top-level competition he lost. 

For my money, Fedor has one legit name on his record that he beat, and that was big Nog, and maybe Mark Hunt at a stretch.

The guy lost to a fucking middleweight by KO, for Christ's sake! And got taken the distance by a legit old and hobbled Jeff Monson!

Even Big Nog came in with a lot of fanfare and lost his fair share against the likes of Roy Nelson, Frank Mir and Cain. 

"but he was past his best by the time he rolled into the UFC and lost to Frank Mir" is what the hardcore's shout....yeah, past his best at 32 years old.

Truth is, most of the fighters who were considered "elite" in Japan have been shown up big time in the UFC, with most being excused by the fanboys who can't handle the fact that their favourite fighters over all those years were basically as good as the likes of Cheick Kongo and Frank Mir.

Let's face it, if Frank Mir had ventured to PRIDE at 25 or 26 years old and healthy he'd have been snapping chumps arms right, left and centre. 

[Egg Shen]

Some strong statements there. I don't disagree with all of them but to say that the Crocop is not a legit name on the resume is a bit silly.

[jimufctna24]

22 minutes ago, David said:

Let's face it, if Frank Mir had ventured to PRIDE at 25 or 26 years old and healthy he'd have been snapping chumps arms right, left and centre. 

Come on David, this is absurd. Did you not see Mir's cardio and striking when he was 25/26? They were dismal. The likes of Fedor, Nog, Kharitonov  Cro Cop and others would have had no problems with him in Pride. 

Even Mir at his best would struggle against Pride's elite. 

22 minutes ago, David said:

Even Big Nog came in with a lot of fanfare and lost his fair share against the likes of Roy Nelson, Frank Mir and Cain. 

"but he was past his best by the time he rolled into the UFC and lost to Frank Mir" is what the hardcore's shout....yeah, past his best at 32 years old.

Watch the Nog who fought Kharitonov and Barnett in Pride and compare him with the version that turned up in the UFC? It was clear that he had lost a good few steps. Which is understandable, he had fought 36 times in 7 years prior to debuting in the UFC. It's not always about age. Cro Cop burnt himself out by fighting too often in Pride. It happened to quite a few fighters in Japan (Sakuraba being the best example)

MMA fighters peak and decline at different times. By your own logic, we could say that Werdum and Overeem's Pride records are reflective of how poor the UFC's Heavyweight division is today. 

22 minutes ago, David said:

For my money, Fedor has one legit name on his record that he beat, and that was big Nog, and maybe Mark Hunt at a stretch.

You can play that game with almost anyone if you spin things a certain way. 

- You could say that JDS is the only legit name on Cain's record

- You could say that Miocic only beat top-tier heavyweights after they had past their peak and lost to the only elite heavyweight he faced (D.C)

[David]

15 minutes ago, Egg Shen said:

Some strong statements there. I don't disagree with all of them but to say that the Crocop is not a legit name on the resume is a bit silly.

I'm saying he was decent, but I don't think he was as good as fans think he was. If he was, he'd have come to the UFC and tore it up, but he didn't, did he?

6 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Come on David, this is absurd. Did you not see Mir's cardio and striking when he was 25/26? They were dismal. The likes of Fedor, Nog, Kharitonov  Cro Cop and others would have had no problems with him in Pride. 

Even Mir at his best would struggle against Pride's elite. 

What's to say that the special Japanese air that made all of these guys superstars in Japan but shadows of their former selves in the US wouldn't have also worked in Mir's favour?

7 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Watch the Nog who fought Kharitonov and Barnett in Pride and compare him with the version that turned up in the UFC? It was clear that he had lost a good few steps.

Why though? Why is it that a chunk of these barbarians who were tearing it up in PRIDE all seemed to "lose a step" when they arrived in the UFC?

It's not as if they went away and retired for years before making the jump. They usually took the time between fights that they usually would.

You know the difference as well as I do, Jim. 

10 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

MMA fighters peak and decline at different times. By your own logic, we could say that Werdum and Overeem's Pride records are reflective of how poor the UFC's Heavyweight division is today.

That's true, but I just find it quite strange that a lot of these "legends" of PRIDE seemed to all decline around the time they signed their UFC contracts.

 

13 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

You can play that game with almost anyone if you spin things a certain way. 

- You could say that JDS is the only legit name on Cain's record

- You could say that Miocic only beat top-tier heavyweights after they had past their peak and lost to the only elite heavyweight he faced (D.C)

Not really. In the UFC, the top guys are facing the top guys. They're not being slated to face blown up middleweights and dudes with acromegaly.

Face it, PRIDE was a freakshow, and when many of their so-called top guys came to the US and the UFC they got handled. 

[wandshogun09]

@Egg Shen Agreed, if we're going down that route then nobody can ever be considered great. 

GSP? He got knocked the fuck out by Matt Serra. Matt Serra who was a fat midget with T-Rex arms, 4 chins and losses to journeymen like Shonie Carter and Chris Lytle.

Anderson Silva? Got submitted by fucking Ryo Chonan and Daiju Takase FFS. 

Fuck, Stipe Miocic? Got knocked out by a 7ft George Dawes. 

Also, let's not confuse a fighter's prime with a fighter's age. You can be a shot fighter by your early 30s just like you can be a freak like Bernard Hopkins and hit your prime in your 40s. Sure Cro Cop might've only been 32 when he was losing to Gonzaga and Kongo. But that's ignoring that he'd already had a load of hard fights by that point in MMA and Kickboxing. He was past his prime. That's just a fact. It's not all about age. Johny Hendricks is only 34, he's just retired because he's fucked. Shogun Rua is 36 but was done by the time he was 31/32. Arturo Gatti retired at 35 but should've stopped after the Mayweather fight when he was 33. Then you look at someone like Daniel Cormier, pushing 40 but far from past it despite his retirement looming. To put it in perspective, Cormier and BJ Penn are near enough exactly the same age. There's a few months in it. Yet their primes were a galaxy apart. 

Age is just a number. And not in the Jimmy Savile way. 

[David]

So, it's just a big ol' coincidence that when most of these PRIDE legends made the jump to the US and the UFC they all "lost a step?"

Come on. I was there as well. I was one of the fans who thought that Cro Cop was gonna come in and start killing fools with high-kicks. I thought Wanderlei was gonna start mauling dudes.

Josh Barnett's another one. "Just wait til he gets here, man! He's gonna tear shit up with catch wrestling and love of heavy metal!"

Got KO'd by Rousey's husband and choked the fuck out by Ben Rothwell.

Here's the truth.

The level of fighter in PRIDE wasn't that good. Sure, it was exciting, and they all matched up really well against each other, but when they started venturing elsewhere they ran into problems.

When it comes to Fedor, there's no fucking way on earth that a man who lost the fights he did post-PRIDE can be considered the greatest of all time. Not a chance.

He's not even top three.

[Keith Houchen]

When you say PRIDE in a Dublin accent, it sounds like PROID.  Accurate.  That added to it for me, roided up skilled fighters, ace!

[jimufctna24]

19 minutes ago, David said:

Why though? Why is it that a chunk of these barbarians who were tearing it up in PRIDE all seemed to "lose a step" when they arrived in the UFC?

It's not as if they went away and retired for years before making the jump. They usually took the time between fights that they usually would.

You know the difference as well as I do, Jim. 

 

- Cro Cop had amassed a lengthy MMA and K1 career. He was burnt out

- The same with Big Nog. Watch how he handled Herring in Pride compared to how he handled him upon his UFC debut. 

- Wanderlei was past his best a long time before he made the jump stateside. I think he peaked in 2004.

- Rampage knocked out Chuck to become champion. Something he couldn't do in Pride.

- Hendo did quite well for himself. In fact, his best years came when he switched to fighting stateside. 

- Fedor had success initially. He beat Arlovski and Sylvia who were the best two heavies that the states had to offer in the mid-2000s

- Mousasi did well for himself in Strikeforce

- Shogun was a mess from 2007-2009. He eventually turned a corner and became Champion. The division evolved after that to where he no longer had the size to compete. 

- The likes of Arona and Barnett didn't make the jump straight away (or at all in Arona's case). Barnett went 3-2 in the UFC in his late 30s. 

I don't dispute the freakshow element of Pride. They did book some right shit. But they had the lion's share of the world's best fighters from middleweight upward from 2002-2007. 

[David]

Just now, jimufctna24 said:

Cro Cop had amassed a lengthy MMA and K1 career. He was burnt out

Burnt out just as he left Japan for the US.

He didn't look "burnt out" when he reeled off four wins in a row in PRIDE beforehand, did he? A submission and four big knock outs.

I guess those four months between winning the PRIDE Grand Prix against Josh Barnett via submission and struggling like fuck against Eddie Sanchez is where the "burnout" took place, right? Lost "a step or two" getting off the plane in Las Vegas?

5 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

The same with Big Nog. Watch how he handled Herring in Pride compared to how he handled him upon his UFC debut.

Same thing, eh? 

Goes from beating Josh Barnett by unanimous decision to being taken to a decision by a guy he submitted in 30 seconds previously.

Probably "losing a step" in the seven months between leaving PRIDE and arriving in California for his UFC debut.

9 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Wanderlei was past his best before he made the jump stateside. I think he peaked in 2004

Aside from Dan Henderson and Ricardo Arona, Wanderlei only lost to guys much heavier over a period of seven years in PRIDE. 

Upon arriving in the UFC he wins exactly four fights in six years, dropping five. He was shite.

13 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Rampage knocked out Chuck to become champion. Something he couldn't do in Pride.

Rampage I'll give you, he did okay in the UFC, same with Henderson. Two American fighters, funnily enough. 

17 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Mousasi did well for himself in Strikeforce

Mousasi wasn't really a PRIDE fighter though, was he? 3 Bushido events doesn't really count. He's spent his prime years in the US and has been successful.

19 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Shogun was a mess from 2007-2009. He eventually turned a corner and became Champion. The division evolved after that to where he no longer had the size to compete.

He was champion for literally a cup of coffee time-wise. UFC record of 9-9. Hardly a reflection on his PRIDE record, is it? Despite the fact there was literally seven months between him crushing Overeem via KO in PRIDE and being handled by Forrest Griffin.

There's been too many of these "legends" who fell apart as soon as they hit US soil for it to be a coincidence.

[wandshogun09]

That's what they were in PROID though, roided up skilled fighters.

I'm not buying this shite that they were inferior to the UFC guys of the same era. Yeah, Sylvia and Arlovski were really fighting the best of the best back then, weren't they? Cabbage Correira, Justin Eilers and Paul 'Don't Fear Me, Fear The Consequences' Buentello. The premiership of heavyweight MMA  

I'm not even disputing that the majority of the Pride guys were juicing. I think it's common knowledge. But despite them having some testing, I doubt most of the UFC's top guys were squeaky clean either. Look at Randy Couture at 42 or whatever he was, ragdolling a 7ft man around and having a back bigger than Ant McPartlin's forehead. Or a young Matt Serra ripped to shreds with veins all over the shop. Phil Baroni. Vitor Belfort. Jeff Monson. All perfectly natural looking specimens. 

The sport as a whole was, and still is, riddled with needle-arsers. So let's not pretend it was only PROID guys and that that's the only reason they struggled when they jumped to the UFC. Switching from the ring to the cage would take some adjusting to, that's a bigger factor than I think many give credit for. Then there's the different rule sets, no knees on the ground, the addition of elbows etc. All factors, as well as lack of PEDs. 

There's a lot of revisionist thinking when it comes to PROID (damn it Keith, I can't stop now). Both from the rose tints side and the hindsight critics. But I was watching at the time too and I don't remember many people predicting Wanderlei Silva to come in and wreck shop. Wandy's prime was over by 2005, when he was still in Japan with his magic pills at his disposal. He was coming into the UFC off bad KO losses to Hendo and Cro Cop. The ride was over. There were high expectations for Cro Cop coming off that GP win in 2006 but whether it was lack of PEDs or not, and I'm not discounting the possibility, he made a right arse of adjusting to the UFC anyway. It was widely known that he wasn't bothering training in a cage as he didn't see the point. He kept training in the ring. Looked OK against Eddie Sanchez in his UFC debut but the signs were there then IMO, when he struggled to cut the cage off when walking Sanchez down and ended up having to take him down for the G&P stoppage. Of course the Gonzaga fight was disaster.

It's all bollocks. There were great and shit fighters on both sides. The likes of Rampage, Anderson and Hendo were all part of the furniture in PROID and they did pretty well in the States. Hunt too, despite mixed results, he's had a good run. 

[Carbomb]

I too welcome the coining of the term PROID. A shame McGregor never fought in that promotion, he'd have been a natural fit.

[jimufctna24]

9 minutes ago, David said:

Burnt out just as he left Japan for the US.

He didn't look "burnt out" when he reeled off four wins in a row in PRIDE beforehand, did he? A submission and four big knock outs.

I guess those four months between winning the PRIDE Grand Prix against Josh Barnett via submission and struggling like fuck against Eddie Sanchez is where the "burnout" took place, right? Lost "a step or two" getting off the plane in Las Vegas?

Combination of a long career catching up to him and adjusting to fighting in the States. Same applies for Big Nog. 

We have seen fighters grow old overnight in the past. Cro Cop was done by the time he fought Kongo. And let's not forget, that Kongo lost to Pride mid-carder Heath Herring after beating Cro Cop. That's why cross comparisons are not always reflective. 

9 minutes ago, David said:

Aside from Dan Henderson and Ricardo Arona, Wanderlei only lost to guys much heavier over a period of seven years in PRIDE. 

Yoshida took him to the limit in 2005. That was a sign of things to come. Wanderlei peaked the night he beat Rampage in late 2004. 

9 minutes ago, David said:

He was champion for literally a cup of coffee time-wise. UFC record of 9-9. Hardly a reflection on his PRIDE record, is it? Despite the fact there was literally seven months between him crushing Overeem via KO in PRIDE and being handled by Forrest Griffin.

There's been too many of these "legends" who fell apart as soon as they hit US soil for it to be a coincidence.

He beat Machida twice and later avenged the loss against Griffin. The form he showed in those three fights dwarfed his performances against Coleman and the first fight against Forrest. 2007-2008 was a blip in Shogun's career. His style was never designed for a long prime either. That's why it is difficult to compare his performances post-2011 to his performances from 2004-2006.  There were many more miles on the clock during the latter period. 

Also, look at Hendo's initial run in the UFC. He beat three highly touted UFC mainstays (Bisping, Franklin, Palhares, lost to a fellow Pride stalwart (Rampage), and lost to Anderson after roughing him up in the first round. 

[David]

Face it, Fedor isn't all he's cracked up to be, and a fair amount of PRIDE "legends" were gassed up to fuck in Japan, and simply couldn't get away with it in the US.

Also, a lot of them just weren't that good in reality.

[jimufctna24]

19 minutes ago, David said:

Face it, Fedor isn't all he's cracked up to be, and a fair amount of PRIDE "legends" were gassed up to fuck in Japan, and simply couldn't get away with it in the US.

Also, a lot of them just weren't that good in reality.

I fail to see why Fedor wasn't all he's cracked up to be. Was he perfect? No, far from it. But the recorded footage doesn't lie. He was an absolute force from 2002-2006. Would you really be confident of Miocic beating peak versions of Cro Cop and Nog in Japan? Because I certainly wouldn't. 

Also, the entire game was gassed as fuck in the mid-2000s. Granted, you just had to be more careful in the states as they did test fighters. However, if your theory was correct that Mir would have turned into a beast had he jumped to Pride in the early 2000s then surely the likes of Gan McGee would have became a force in Pride. Instead, he went 0-2, losing to two gatekeepers along the way in Schilt and Herring. 

Sure, the likes of Gomi and Sokoudjou were probably not as good as their runs in Japan made them seem. But the vast majority of Pride's top fighters were the business. Barring Cro Cop and Wanderlei, most of them proved it in the UFC as well at some point or another.