MMA Questions Thread

[Carbomb]

Couldn't find another thread, but then I didn’t really look. 

Just saw this:

Is that guy bullshitting, or is there in fact a rule about leg-checking?

[wandshogun09]

Ha, nah that’s bollocks. Checking leg kicks is a totally legal technique as far as I’ve understood it. Be a bit shitty if they made the method of blocking or defence for leg kicks illegal.

Without any context I’m gonna guess that’s coming from an Anderson Silva fan who couldn’t/still can’t accept the reign was/is over. There were a lot of them at the time and I still see the occasional comment about Weidman fluking it even in the first fight, which I’ve always maintained is shite. It’s easy to spin it that way now because Weidman’s career went to shit after a couple of title defences but he beat Anderson fair and square. 

[Carbomb]

Cheers for that, wand - I thought that must have been the case. Only way I thought there could have been a rule that I missed was if Weidman kicked back and hit the shin - like how boxing doesn't allow backfists or blocking with the palms - but it just reeked of some Two-Can Van Damme playing know-it-all.

[jimufctna24]

I do not recall a MMA league outlawing kick checking. I do recall a few people calling for the banning of calf and oblique kicks (the opposite really). 

As for Weidman vs Silva, I remember listening to the Jordan Breen show immediately after their first bout and Breen having to fend off what Wand alluded to above  (people discrediting Weidman's win). In truth, Weidman was simply a horrible style match-up for Silva imo and executed well on the night. 

Edited July 29, 2025 by jimufctna24

[wandshogun09]

Yep. The common excuse was ‘Anderson was clowning around too much, Weidman got lucky’. Conveniently forgetting that Anderson clowned around in a bunch of his previous fights and won and it wasn’t a problem. They also conveniently block out the first round where Weidman was giving him all kinds of grief in the grappling (dominated the first rounds of both fights actually). I always felt like the reason Anderson was so animated and clowning around in that first fight was because he was trying to throw Weidman off his game plan (which was clearly heavily focused on wrestling judging by the first round) and antagonise him into just standing and striking. It worked but then Anderson got sparked. Probably because, even in the striking exchanges, he was still always half expecting Weidman to change levels for a takedown. 

That’s MMA 101 right there. Like Matt Serra said before scoring the upset over GSP - “You don’t gotta be the better striker to outstrike someone in MMA. He’s thinking one thing, I’m doing the other…the fight could be over.” It’s not a fluke and I couldn’t believe how many fans couldn’t see that. Couldn’t see past the bare minimum surface level of what was on the screen and ask why Anderson was acting like that. He acted even worse against Demian Maia but Maia couldn’t get the grappling going and wasn’t equipped make him pay on the feet. He also had a shockingly lacklustre performance against Thales Leites, despite clearly winning. What do Weidman, Maia and Leites have in common? Strong grappling bases. What had been Anderson’s two big MMA losses at this point? Daiju Takase and Ryo Chonan, both by submission. It all makes sense why Anderson might be spooked or a bit hesitant against those types of opponents when you take the blinders off but there are Anderson fans to this day who will swear blind it was a pure fluke (it wasn’t) and that Anderson was just about to turn both fights around (he wasn’t) when a simple case of bad luck befell him (twice).

I will say though, I always found it absolutely mad how Weidman ended up suffering the exact same leg injury in the Uriah Hall fight a few years later.

What are the chances? You can count on one hand the amount of times this injury has happened in the UFC and two of them involved Weidman, on the giving and receiving end. 

[jimufctna24]

4 minutes ago, wandshogun09 said:

I always felt like the reason Anderson was so animated and clowning around in that first fight was because he was trying to throw Weidman off his game plan (which was clearly heavily focused on wrestling judging by the first round) and antagonise him into just standing and striking. It worked but then Anderson got sparked. Probably because, even in the striking exchanges, he was still always half expecting Weidman to change levels for a takedown. 

Aye, agreed. Weidman also jabbed well and feinted to further dull Silva's ability to counter.  Weidman was a better boxer than many gave him credit for. 

 

23 minutes ago, wandshogun09 said:

He acted even worse against Demian Maia but Maia couldn’t get the grappling going and wasn’t equipped make him pay on the feet. He also had a shockingly lacklustre performance against Thales Leites, despite clearly winning. What do Weidman, Maia and Leites have in common? Strong grappling bases.

Indeed, I will add that Maia, Leites, along with Cote fought very negatively against Silva, probably a consequence of seeing what occurred when the likes of Leben, Griffin, etc lunged at him. Unlike those fighters, and many others, Weidman had the tools and gameplan to not either get sparked with a counter or spend 25 minutes in a shell. 

[wandshogun09]

Right. I really don't wanna jinx it but a thought just occurred to me randomly for some reason.

Is Bigfoot Silva actually, you know…finally retired?

Don’t know why he popped into my head this sunny Saturday morning but I was just thinking back to that time when it seemed like every other month there’d be the dreaded Bigfoot fight announcement and we’d all collectively groan. Then the day after each fight we’d all be on here depressed after watching him plod into another KO loss. I just thought, we haven’t done that in a long time. I looked him up and the last things I can find on him are he lost a decision to some fucker called Salim El Ouassaidi in June 2023 and apparently he did announce his retirement post-fight, but predictably went back on that shortly after and expressed interest in a rematch. But the very last fight I can find on record was him going to a draw with ex UFC Heavyweight prelimer Juan Espino in March 2024. Can only find that on Bigfoot’s Tapology page though, that fight isn’t listed on his Sherdog or Wikipedia pages for some reason. Can’t find any evidence of him taking any Boxing, Kickboxing or Bare Knuckle fights since then so that’s his last fight as I type this.

No doubt now I’ve posted this, there’ll be a fight announcement tomorrow or something. Hopefully I haven’t tempted fate with this and maybe his family and close friends have finally been able to talk him off the ledge. I know he got married again a couple of years or so ago so maybe his new wife was the person he needed in his life who would actually look out for him and finally convince him to stop.

Bless him. 

From what I can find, if you combined his MMA, Boxing, Kickboxing and Bare Knuckle fights, since 2013 he went a staggering 1-15-1-1, 13 of the 15 losses were by KO/TKO and 6 of them were in the first round. And of course he’s had more losses and been knocked out more than that if you look at his whole career. I just went from his last big win, which was that mad knockout he scored against Overeem in February 2013 and looked at his wins and losses since then. At 45 and after all the abuse he’s taken in various rings and cages over the years, for his own sake I hope he never throws or takes a punch again.

So yeah, I’ve rambled and it’s kind of a rhetorical question but is he finally retired? 

Please? 

[Egg Shen]

Yeah, I hope the big man has finally hung them up. Prime Bigfoot was top entertainment but those last few years were just sad, one of the saddest downfalls in the history of the sport.

[neil]

On 8/30/2025 at 3:07 AM, wandshogun09 said:

since 2013 he went a staggering 1-15-1-1, 13 of the 15 losses were by KO/TKO and 6 of them were in the first round

Aye, but you know if he did fight some blabbering MMA pundit/commentator would be going "You can't count him out B, he has a chance" or some nonsense.

[Cousin Jim Bob]

I saw it mentioned very briefly on a YouTube video that Pride absolutely fucked over Guy Mezger to make Sakuraba vs Royce Gracie. Its been so long I've forgotten but does that sound right?

The Wiki is a bit sparse.

[wandshogun09]

59 minutes ago, Cousin Jim Bob said:

I saw it mentioned very briefly on a YouTube video that Pride absolutely fucked over Guy Mezger to make Sakuraba vs Royce Gracie. Its been so long I've forgotten but does that sound right?

The Wiki is a bit sparse.

My memory is vague but from what I remember about that, it was Mezger’s own mentor and cornerman Ken Shamrock who fucked Mezger over more than anything. 

Sakuraba and Mezger fought in the first round of the Pride Grand Prix tournament in 2000. The opening round fights in that GP were all just one 15 minute round where if it ended in a draw, they’d do a second sort of a ‘sudden death’ round to determine a winner. From what I recall of the fight, Mezger was getting the better of it. Wasn’t battering Sakuraba or anything but was able to mostly shut down his attempts to grapple and Mezger was winning the standup. The 15 minutes expired and they went to the judges. It looked like Mezger had won, but the judges had it a draw. Harsh on Mezger and probably a bit of home fighter favouritism from the judges there, but they were all set to go to a second round. Then this wally stuck his beak in…

Old Kenny, so angry that his protege got robbed, orders Mezger to leave the ring and go back to the locker room. Like he’s a little kid being sent to bed or something. Ken snapped, I guess. He was “in the zone”. The ref’s lucky he never got belly to belly suplexed. So as a result of Shamrock’s tantrum, Mezger lost the fight via forfeit and Sakuraba advanced to the quarter finals for that 90 minute fight with Royce. 

So yeah, Ken was so furious that his fighter was shafted by the judges, that he pulled him out of a fight he could still fucking win and ensured he actually did lose. Try and work that logic out. Ken essentially robbed Mezger of a chance at the biggest win of his career. He’d have probably chinned Royce in the next round as well actually. Although I think Coleman or Igor would’ve dealt with him. 

Edited October 15, 2025 by wandshogun09

[jimufctna24]

Mezger was considered a better natural talent than Frank Shamrock and thus probably had a higher ceiling, which is notable given that Franky was considered one of the best fighters of the 90s. The reason Mezger never reached his potential seemingly was that unlike Frank he remained with the Lion's Den and under the guidance of Ken. The Lion's Den tended to focus on building mass, hard sparring, leg locks and brawling to the detriment of conditioning and more advanced striking/grappling. 

If you watch back TUF 3 it especially becomes clear that by the 2000s the game had since long passed Ken by. A friend of Ross Pointon's told me that what was shown on TV was actually generous to Ken. Apparently Ken's training was so poor that the UFC had to bring in additional trainers to work with his team. 

Btw, while I haven't watched the fights myself, Mezger took Little Nog to a split decision in Pride, and I have even seen some suggest that Mezger was also robbed of a win over Ricardo Arona also in Pride. He also gave Liddell a heck of a fight too, almost stopping the then iron-chinned Liddell before he faded. He did all this, and more, with the albatross of the Lion's Den. Imagine what he could have done had he been under the guidance of one of the better trainers of the time (Miletich, Rutten, etc)

Edited October 16, 2025 by jimufctna24

[Cousin Jim Bob]

30 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

Mezger was considered a better natural talent than Frank Shamrock and thus probably had a higher ceiling, which is notable given that Franky was considered one of the best fighters of the 90s. The reason Mezger never reached his potential seemingly was that unlike Frank he remained with the Lion's Den and under the guidance of Ken. The Lion's Den tended to focus on building mass, hard sparring, leg locks and brawling to the detriment of conditioning and more advanced striking/grappling. 

If you watch back TUF 3 it especially becomes clear that by the 2000s the game had since long passed Ken by. A friend of Ross Pointon's told me that what was shown on TV was actually generous to Ken. Apparently Ken's training was so poor that the UFC had to bring in additional trainers to work with his team. 

Btw, while I haven't watched the fights myself, Mezger took Little Nog to a split decision in Pride, and I have even seen some suggest that Mezger was also robbed of a win over Ricardo Arona also in Pride. He also gave Liddell a heck of a fight too, almost stopping the then iron-chinned Liddell before he faded. He did all this, and more, with the albertros of the Lion's Den. Imagine what he could have done had he trained with one of the better trainers of the time (Miletich, Rutten, etc)

 

I've watched a few Mezger fights today. He did look very talented but with some batshit crazy tactics at times. He was out landing and had Wanderlai cut over his eye early, he was looking extremely sharp before getting bombed out of there.  Maybe he got over confident but getting in a firefight with Silva was probably not the best idea in the world.

Edited October 16, 2025 by Cousin Jim Bob

[jimufctna24]

I'm aware the late 1990s and very early 2000s are not considered to be a golden age of MMA. I remember both Wand's reviews of early Pride events and MMA/Boxing historian CombatChronicles' retrospective describing how dull early Pride events could be. In fact I've seen some argue that MMA only really got good in the mid 2000s.

That said, I still find the late 90s and early 2000s an interesting era to discuss. The Gracies and most notably Rickson clinging on to their auras, Lion's Den wasting natural talent, the rise and fall of Kerr, Takada being a bit of a fraud, Coleman's career resurrection, Sakuraba being at his peak and probably the best fighter in the world, etc, etc. 

 

[wandshogun09]

54 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

If you watch back TUF 3 it especially becomes clear that by the 2000s the game had since long passed Ken by. A friend of Ross Pointon's told me that what was shown on TV was actually generous to Ken. Apparently Ken's training was so poor that the UFC had to bring in additional trainers to work with his team. 

Yeah, that was a running joke that carried over even into TUF 4 with Matt Serra taking the piss out of Shamrock’s lack of work ethic as coach on the previous season. “Eat steak!” ?

I don’t mind Ken and he was definitely a pioneer of MMA and one of the main reasons a lot of pro wrestling fans got on board with the UFC in the early years. I’ve said a few times on here that I think him and Tito don’t get the credit they deserve for basically keeping the UFC afloat at a crucial time in the early 2000s. TUF 1 and the first Griffin vs Bonnar fight gets all the praise but if not for Ken and Tito there might not have been such a thing as ‘UFC’ to even do a reality show with in 2004. Obviously we know why those guys don’t get their due these days and it’s all to do with not being on a certain pink faced, bald headed wife beater’s Christmas card list.

But…yeah, it’s undeniable that by 2006 when TUF 3 was being filmed, MMA had passed Shamrock by and his coaching methods were outdated even then. I remember watching that season with my brother at the time and we were cracking up at the contrast of Tito’s team training their arses off then they’d switch to Team Shamrock and Ken just had them watching tape of him knocking out Kimo. It was ridiculous. I’ve got no doubt the likes of Mezger were held back by Ken and his archaic training camps back then. As both of you have said, he clearly had skills. Especially for the time he competed in. But he was hamstrung by his own loyalty to the Lion’s Den, in my opinion.

23 minutes ago, Cousin Jim Bob said:

I've watched a few Mezger fights today. He did look very talented but with some batshit crazy tactics at times. He was out landing and had Wanderlai cut over his eye early, he was looking extremely sharp before getting bombed out of there.  Maybe he got over confident but getting in a firefight with Silva was probably not the best idea in the world.

I was gonna mention that Wandy fight after reading Jim’s post. Cracking little scrap that was. And yeah, Mezger was having success. Not many were beating Wand in a wild brawl back then though. But it didn’t help that Wand snuck in a headbutt in the finishing attack either. Bit of his bare knuckle Vale Tudo roots coming out there. Although he was still fucking headbutting in that mess of a Boxing match the other week where he got sparked after. So it seems he’s never quite shaken those late 90s Vale Tudo instincts. 

3 minutes ago, jimufctna24 said:

I'm aware the late 1990s and very early 2000s are not considered to be a golden age of MMA. I remember both Wand's reviews of early Pride events and MMA/Boxing historian CombatChronicles' retrospective describing how dull early Pride events could be. In fact I've seen some argue that MMA only really got good in the mid 2000s.

Yeah, if anyone’s interested, I did actually start working my way through the Pride shows and reviewing them on here. Found the old thread. From 2017!

I only got as far as Pride 11 unfortunately but that 2000 GP is covered in there. Plenty of ball-achingly long and shit fights reviewed in there, along with a lot of interesting stuff as well. Shame I didn’t finish that journey, don’t know what derailed it at the time.

I’m with you Jim. As much as there was some absolute dross on those old cards, in Pride and the UFC, I do have a soft spot for that time in MMA. It was the beginning of a completely different sport and we witnessed it in real time. So things weren’t always gonna run smoothly. What a crazy time it was though.