MMA_Jim

Here are my views on the topic: Comparing styles IS something worth doing. Not all styles are equal, they were all developed over the course of the past 2000 years with different objectives in mind. Not all of their objectives was modern day self defense. First off, almost all styles of martial arts were devised as a means of teaching ones armies or fighters if you will, how to win on the battlefield. Different cultures fight with different weapons at different periods of time on different landscapes, so you see how so many styles can be in such contrast. Secondly, comparing fighters as opposed to styles would work if the fighters well equally trained. This is applicable for example, in the UFC because all fighters are trained in the same techniques. This is not applicable when comparing say, a jiu jitsu fighter with a boxer, karateka, or any other standup fighter because one isnt familiar with the others' techniques. Lets assume you take a world class striker- (Mike Tyson from boxing, Stephan Leko muay thai, and Bill Wallace karate) and we have him do 50 fights to see how skilled a fighter he is, but theres a catch- each of the other 50 fighters is either highly skilled in jiu jitsu or submission wrestling. As such theres a strong possibility that hes not going to win very many matches. So by the end of the experiment he holds a record of 0-50. Does that mean hes a poor fighter despite his winning record in his respective style? Of course not, but what it does strongly suggest was that his style of fighting was severely lacking something when compared to the styles he fought. Finally, if you were to stage one single fight between two people of opposing styles, you could argue that its a matchup of fighters, not styles. Keep in mind however, that the fighter's style of fighting is influenced by what style he trains in! Nontheless, we could still call it a matchup of fighters, since running the experiment one time is not sufficient for conclusive results. If the experiment is run more than once with different combatants, the results can become more conslusive as far as comparing the styles is concerned.

I second that one- I like doubling up on hooks as well. Sometimes if my opponent is doing a good job of blocking up top, I'll try a stiff jab to the gut followed by a right haymaker. Another alternative I like is an inside lead cut kick followed by whatever hand combo you'd prefer.

If you really wanted to push the envelope, you could argue this both ways. MMA can be considered both a ruleset and a style, should you argue it correctly. First off, it is a ruleset, if for nothing else the rules were established before the fighting game began to evolve. Not only that, but while MMA is widely regarded as pretty much being muay thai, bjj, and wrestling, its not exclusive to those styles. Furthermore, there are no rules that limit techniques, only striking areas for the safety of the fighters' careers. It is indeed open to people who train from all styles of fighting. Another reason I would argue against it being a style is that styles are one way to categorize a persons fighting preferences. There are, for example, 3 types of fighters you'll see in MMA competition. Sprawl and brawl kickboxers, ground and pound wrestlers, and submission fighters. What you are now dealing with is three different sorts of techniques which share almost no similarities in techniques, much less strategy. If MMA were indeed a style, fighters would tend to have similar strategies, but this isnt the case. Some fighters argue for the point of keeping the fight on the feet. Other argue the effectiveness of the submissions game, and still others argue for the simplicity of the ground and pound game. The strategy for striking is to be quick, powerfull, and aggressive. Unleash everything on your opponent when he gives an opening. Overkill if you will. The strategy for ground and pound wrestlers is similar- lots of strength, lots of power, but a bit more controlled- beat your opponent, but first put him in a place you can hit him much more effectively than he can hit you- on his back. Finally, the strategy for the submission oriented fighters is to be patient. Strength, speed, and aggression are of less importance than patience and technique. Take advantage of your opportunities, but dont rush the fight. Now, if you wanted to argue for MMA being a style, I could understand that line, but its still shortsighted. Its only its own style in the sense that overall, one is taught the same basic range of effective techniques from muay thai, wrestling, and jiu jitsu. However, it is the attention to detail that makes each of those styles effective, and less the techniques themselves. In other words, just because its being taught in the cirriculum doesnt qualify you as being that particular style of fighter. There are joint locks and throws taught in karate just as there are elbows and knees taught in bjj, but a BJJ fighter is no more an expert in muay thai than a karate fighter is an expert in grappling. Now, that being said, muay thai, wrestling, and BJJ are their own styles. The only thing is that they were able to effectively adopt to the ruleset of MMA. Theres more to BJJ than just fighting in a cage- it is its own martial art. These styles were not devised for cage fighting- they were simply adopted to it

No, I wouldnt, and let me explain why. Many TMA's are filled with numerous rules, some of which were instilled for combative nature, but many which have been changed for the protection of the participants. As I said before, MMA is not a style, its a ruleset. The fact that many traditional styles did extremely poorly led to the distinguishment of MMA guys on one side, and TMA'ers (karate, TKD, Kung Fu, what have you) on the other. Now, all styles of fighting are NOT equal. They all serve a purpose, and modern day unarmed combat is not what most of them were derived for. As such, you become limited in the rules as to what you can do. In karate you can only kick and punch In boxing you can only punch. In Judo you can only throw and briefly wrestle on the ground with submissions In wrestling you can only wrestle, with no submissions or strikes allowed. So now what if your opponent doesnt want to play your game? What if I dont want to wrestle a wrestler, or box with a boxer? How effective is his style of fighting if we takes the rules away hes so accustomed to fighting under? THAT is what MMA is all about. Every style of fighting is going to have champions that claim to be the best. Let them fight the champions of other styles and see who prevails. The biggest difference I see between stepping into the cage and being in a competition, is that people are genuinely trying to hurt you in the cage. It truely is a unique feeling and all fighters feel the pre-fight jitters. Many cant handle it and as a result refuse to do it. Rather than giving those that step up to fight their due credit, a great many try everything they can to discredit them and take away what they are- the worlds best hand to hand fighters.

I dont think that MMA'ers have ever gotten the stereotype of not being able to defend themselves in a real life situation. Ironically, its the other way around. Because of the creation of UFC and various other fight organizations, traditional martial artists seem to have gotten that stereotype. The biggest thing that differentiates mma fighters from traditional is that mma fighters are willing to fight to prove what they've got. Many traditional fighters dont, for whatever reason, and theres nothing wrong with that. Lets make up two examples for the sake of argument- one mma'er who fights and one traditional ma'er who doesnt. Please dont read into this argument as an attack on karate, tkd, or kung fu. MMA IS NOT A STYLE. As such, consider our mma fighter to be trained in whatever you like to imagine him being trained in- hes a karate fighter, a tkd'er, a judoka, or a kung fu expert. But bottom line is he fights. The mma'er who fights is average at best, but hes had plenty of fights and hes 12-10 in the cage. The traditional ma'er never fought, but hes a high ranking black belt in a traditional system, call it any kind of karate, tkd, or kung fu. He only trains, and doesnt teach. Problem with this situation here is that it leaves us with one conclusion: We have documented evidence that the mma'er is an accomplished fighter and have proven that his techniques work against a fully resisting opponent intent on defeating him. He's also got experience, which counts for alot as any former fighter or sports player would tell you. At the other end, we have no documented evidence of the tma'er ever using what he has in an actual fighting/self defense scenario. The term "evidence" here means a video. Many people point to stories of great feats, or bar brawls or street fights against numerous opponents as being credible resources, but I'll address that in a minute. What we now have is one fighter whos proven, and another whos not. One fighter who we know, from videotape, has the capacity to choke someone out, knock someone out, or take someone down. We know nothing about the other. So, when someone questions our mma'er as whether or not something hes teaching is practical or real, he can throw in a tape and say "yep- it worked right here, and you can see and judge for yourself." Now many people like to use the "street fight" card as the ultimate proving ground, and I'll explain the flaws with this. First off, we need a definition of a "street fighter." Many seem to think that a street fighter is a down and dirty fighter whos brutal to the utmost degree and will stoop to any level to win a fight. A more accurate definition: someone who has no formal training in the science (not art) of fighting. A novice or complete beginner if you will. Every beginner student that comes into your school would otherwise be labeled a "street fighter" for the simple fact that he has no experience in any system of fighting. Hopefully you'll see where this argument is going. We now have stories of so and so beating up someone at the bar using his techniques, but we're forced to ask the following questions: 1: Who was this person fighting? Was he capable of fighting in the first place? 2: Was he athletically the equivalent of the person who so technically defeated him? 3: What was the weight disparity? 4: Who's reporting this story? Do they even have any knowledge of fighting? Imagine if Joe Schmo started commentating the UFC and had no idea what hes watching- he cant explain technically what was done and why it was done. Then take Joe Rogan. Regardless of your personal thoughts, Rogan knows whats going on, can explain what move is being done and WHY its being done. Perhaps most importantly, he can explain why its even working. Now the multiple opponents card gets put into this same category. How good were the people this person was fighting? Did they even fight back? Was the story embellished if it wasnt fabricated to begin with? Aside from that, we dont have a pure experiment to judge this with. Tell someone you're going to choke them unconcious regardless of what they do to stop you, and you do it- thats a show of technique. Sucker attack someone who's not even a fighter and knock them out- what have you proven? For example- the popular mike valley vs 4 people street fight on you tube. Someone uneducated would tell the story that he defended himself from and beat up 4 attackers at once. Watch the video, and you'll see that he none of the 4 "attackers" in the video even throw a punch at him, with the exception of 1 frail looking character who is slapping at him at the end. Hopefully, you'll begin to understand the point Im trying to make So, since a street fighter is a novice fighter who does not regularly partake in fights (regardless of how his persona may reflect otherwise) hes already at a great disadvantage. What happens when a black belt fights a white belt? This is the same thing, the exception being that we're not wearing uniforms or in a dojo. So for all we know, we may have a 185lb karate master who's in great physical condition who gets into a fight with a 170 college student who drinks with his buddies every weekend. With a 15 lb advantage, physical superiority, and experience with striking, we could be content that such a fight could have been won on athleticism alone, and no technique was required. A UFC fight on the other hand, pairs fighters based on weight so that size and strength are as close as can be. Both fighters are athletes and should be in great physical condition. Both are fighters, and have knowledge of the science of fighting, both on the feet and on the ground. Both are proven, having reputable records from fights in the past. We're left now with the best possible pairing of natrual ability we can do. This leaves us to see one thing now: technique!

Practically all the time- whenever a police officer initiates an arrest against a resisting suspect they generally take them to the ground. A man on his back is helpless, unless he has any knowledge of groundfighting and as such has knowledge of the ground. Theres nothing your opponent can "jack up" when hes mounted. Putting someone on their back is as big a disadvantage as you could get- especially considering how much weight a larger person can get behind his strikes when on the feet. When on his back he no longer has the ability to utlize his size advantage and unless he has knowledge of the ground game he is in trouble (i.e. at a disadvantage) regardless of how much he tries to kick and flail about. As far as putting someone face down, you're talking about getting your opponents back- this is called the back mount. The back mount and the mount are the most advantageous positions one can acheive while on the ground. A usually progression that occurs when putting untrained people to the ground is they end up giving their back. For example, do you know how to get up from the ground without giving the back position? Few people do. Most will roll over to their stomach and attempt to get back to their feet by pushing themselves up. In doing so, they give their back. That being said, almost all takedowns are designed to put your opponent on his back. Whether your opponent gives you the opportunity to take the back position depends on HOW HE REACTS. Whether or not you get the back position depends on how versed you are in groundfighting. Simply put, your opponent does jiu jitsu to himself- his reactions tell you what to do. So its less of a decision of what you're going to do (i.e. "Im going to put him on the ground face down and take his back!") and more along the lines of what your opponent gives you (i.e. " I took him down, and he didnt know what he was doing- he tried to roll over to get back to his feet made the mistake of giving up his back") Let me summarize in a phrase made popular by JJM: "I am a shark- the ground is my ocean... and most people dont even know how to swim" Shujika, taking your opponents back is perhaps the best position to get, however this depends on whether or not you have your "hooks" in or you are attacking your opponents "turtle" position. Your hooks are your feet, which act as control on your opponent, allowing you to keep your position on his back, despite his rolling around trying to get you off. This frees up your hands from doing this task, and therefore allows them to attack your opponents neck with various strangles. One is the perhaps the most effective move ever devised- its called the rear naked choke.

This is true because: -Soldiers fight with weapons -There are no weight classes in real life -You will rarely fight another well trained fighter -modern day mma fighters are far more skilled than a modern day soldier That being said, modern combatives as taught in the armed forces is essentially MMA (the hand to hand training anyways) A swift jab will do much more damage than a poke in the eyes. For one, if you dont hit the eyes dead on, you're very likely to injure your fingers. It requires such fine motor movements, that which your body loses under the stress of fight or flight. The same is said of a front kick to the groin. Its not a very reliable technique and its very easy to block. Strikes to the back of the head require some sort of positional dominance (i.e. achieving back mount). These techniques have been made illegal to protect the fighters careers. Eye gouges have been used many times in early MMA, and have shown almost no success. The risk being that the other fighter risks losing his vision. In a real fight, the other fighter (having lost) would be dead. Groin kicks still happen in modern day MMA, with refs not always spotting the foul. Once again, a fighter doesnt want to chance having to need surgery on his groin or possibly being unable to have children because of a fight. Strikes to the back of the head have been made illegal due to the build up of damage to the spine-but this attack was almost exclusive to BJJ fighters who had the skill to get to their opponents back. These techniques dont do much to change the tide of a fight, but they're illegal because the chances are high that after a few fights, a fighter would lose vision, his "tender" organs, or full mobility from constant spine attacks. We arent discounting eye gouges or groin shots, its just that most people severely overrate them. Eye gouges and groin shots are not fight enders- they are most often annoying. I have been involved in situations when people have attempted to bite, eye gouge, and attack my groin, none of which helped them any. Closing my eyes took care of most eye gouges, and any that got through simply hurt and blurred my vision, but once a grappler has a hold of you he doesnt need this. Groin attacks once again hurt, but didnt stop me from grabbing ahold of the attacker and paying him back. Biting is probably the more ineffective thing. Human teeth arent very strong, and theres really no situation that a bite would be more desirable when you consider the power and leverage one can get throwing elbows and punches instead.

The scarf hold can be applied from overhooks (kinda like a head and arm headlock) or with an underhook for maximum efficiency. Heres the catch though- Its great for pinning an opponent or otherwise making it very difficult for him to escape. Against someone with a good scarf hold and with an underhook, escaping this position can be very difficult, but its not of much importance. No attacks are really available from this position, other than a keylock with your legs, which wont get experienced opponents. Essentially, its a holding position. If you start to punch, you let go of one of your grips, making it drastically easier for your opponent to get to his side and escape. If you want to set up a series of attack, you need to switch your hips back to face your opponent to start an attack. So, it could be used, but all you're going to do is hold your opponent there, doing no damage, and threatening no submission attempts. As such your opponent isnt really in any danger. If all you do is hold, you'll simply be stood up or otherwise penalized for holding the fight.

Well, Im not counting simple attacks like "Can Openers" and things like that. Submitting someone from inside their own guard isnt impossible, its just never going to be done against anyone who's any good, and you take a significant risk while attempting it. You'll submit white belts, and thats about it

Saulo is much much more accomplished than Fedor is in grappling. Fedor is much much more accomplished than Saulo is in MMA. That being said, Ricardo Arona fought Fedor early in both of their careers, and arguably beat Fedor. Saulo and Arona are similar in regards to the pressure they have when passing and their strength at takedowns. So while Saulo would be a significant underdog, if he were to take Fedor to the ground, the tables turn.

Heres the heads up on it, but you need to take into account how good the instruction is. BJJ has better groundwork than Judo Wrestling has better takedowns than BJJ Judo is kinda like the middle ground. If there is a difference in instructors though, it would sway my opinion. Training with an Olympic Judoka would yield better results than say, training with a blue/purple belt instructor in BJJ. Perhaps you could post some information on the instructors

Saulo Ribeiro earned his BJJ black belt in three years. That was under Royler Gracie. If the skill is there, the rank will be awarded. But Purple in a month is a bit exaggerated. There's a certain loyalty aspect as well. Who told you that? Saulo told me that at a seminar. Here's a link that has his start date and date of black belt also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saulo_Ribeiro I see- thats only taking into account when he started BJJ. Saulo actually started off with Judo, which Brazil's is second in the world only to Japan. While he took 3 years of BJJ, he had previous grappling experience- I believe he did Judo for at least a year prior.

No one is questioning Cung's standup skills, though there are many fighters I think who have better standup than he does. People are questioning what happens when he fights a good grappler. Now Shamrock, while a good grappler, wanted to stand and box with with Le. Imagine if Royce Gracie tried to stand and box with Mike Tyson- not many would be surprised of the outcome of that match.

Sylva may not be able to beat Jones. There is no questioning Jones' skill in the ring; even at his age now. But the match would be fun to watch. You are taking two athletes that are both in the upper echelon of their respective disciplines. It would be fun to watch, and kind of a historical type of challenge match.You're talking two completely different styles of fighting. In a straight boxing match, Roy Jones Jr is going to dominate Anderson Silva- no ifs ands or buts about it. Boxing allows hitting with the fists only and no clinch fighting. Many things used in boxing cannot be used in a actual fight as a result (take bobbing and weaving for example). Bob and weave in a muay thai fight, and you'll wake up on a hospital bed. Such things are of limited value to someone like Silva, who fights under fewer rules. I would expect Anderson to be able to defend against Jones Jr and go the distance. I would not, however, expect Jones Jr to be able to defend himself against Silva in either a muay thai or mma bout and certainly wouldnt expect him to go the distance.

Saulo Ribeiro earned his BJJ black belt in three years. That was under Royler Gracie. If the skill is there, the rank will be awarded. But Purple in a month is a bit exaggerated. There's a certain loyalty aspect as well. Who told you that? In regards to the original question, BJJ is training with the gi. Fedor would do well, since hes got much Judo experience. I wouldnt expect Randy to do so well- depends how well he can pass a guard and control his opponent with a gi on. Shamrock I would expect would be a blue belt for life- hes far from a technical grappler in my book. Once again, adding a gi to someone who's been doing no gi their entire life switches things up significantly. Diego Sanchez, for example, was a white belt until recently

An ezekial choke is best applied from positions other than inside your opponents guard. When attempted against someone with a decent guard game, the ezekial will simply get you swept, as someone else pointed out, or even should you base out, get you armbarred from the person on the bottom. Should you attempt and ezekial from bottom mount, its easily defended when your opponent pushes your elbows, and follows up with an armlock on you. To address the original posters question, there really arent any submissions to be applied from within your opponents guard. This has less to do with the fact that your opponent is controlling your hips than it does the fact that you're not controlling his. Any submission requires that you extend your arms in some manner. In doing that, your opponent is able to move his hips in some position in order to set up an armbar for you. If you want to fight to submit your opponent from inside his guard, you'll ultimately just end up wasting your time and slowing your technical progress as a grappler. Open your opponents guard and look to pass, then you can submit him with whatever you like

The best way to fight a bigger stronger opponent is to put him on his back. As a result, to try to get away from your opponent after you successfully took him to the ground and therefore gave yourself the best possible advatage to win wouldnt be practical. Mount or knee in the belly, and attack

It had to be one of the worst fights that I've ever seen (well, not the complete worst). For one, this "fight" looked more like a sparring match than it did an actual fight. As far as Le's fancy kicks, none of the fancy ones he used were really effective at all. His spinning kicks didnt do anything, and his side kicks werent much more than a waste of energy on his part. The best ones he had were straight forward roundhouse kicks. I personally dont think Le proved anything in that fight, other than hes got slightly better striking skills than Frank Shamrock. He may have beaten Frank, but thats because Frank was too stupid and arrogant to play a smart gameplan. Le didnt stop any of Frank's takedowns, because Frank didnt attempt any. Le's groundskills havent been tested yet, and while he did finally fight a game opponent in shamrock, shamrock basically fought a kickboxing match against him.

hitting kyusho points can shut down the Central Nervous System.. that wont just "stall" them.. even though it could be hard to hit in a combat situation.. I dont rely entirely on it.. but I dont think that it is a complete waste of time.. Then let someone demonstrate their usefullness by using them in some form of competitive event against a resisting opponent. Such evidence doesnt exist, and if you could do it, you'd be very successfull in grappling competitions. Pressure points work great when you demonstrate against a non-resisting opponent because his muscles are relaxed and allows for easy manipulation of the nerves. During a fight, imagine your opponent as a soldier wearing armor- the armor being his muscles. By contracting his muscles (as a boxer does when he breathes out as his punches) he protects himself against his opponents attacks.

The same things that work against normal sized opponents often work the same against large sized opponents- what matters is how technically you execute them. Strength is used in all fighting techniques. Against someone your own size, only a little technique is needed to compliment your strength in order to make a technique work. The stronger, heavier, and more athletic your opponent, the more important the technical execution of your move. That being said, I think one of the best things to use against overly large opponents is a single leg takedown. Single legs can be done against anyone, regardless of their size, and big people tend to have poor balance due to their size, making it easier to finish a single leg takedown on them than on a smaller more agile opponent

I'll give you the simplest definition of TMA there can be. First we'll say what is not TMA, and that would be those recognized as MMA: Styles such as: BJJ, Wrestling, Boxing, Muay Thai, Judo, and Sambo Traditional styles for the most part is everything else but that. There are more classifications though- you have Reality Based Self Defense (RBSD) for example, but thats often nothing more than rehashed and repackaged TMA. When someone says MMA or refers to it they're talking about modern fighting and styles devised for modern combat. Traditional styles study old methods of fighting that differ greatly than modern and therefore yield different results. For example, many of the movements of Japanese Ju Jitsu are devised to be done while wearing a suit of armor and flying kicks of TKD trace their influence back to attempts at unhorsing invading samurai. We dont wear suits of armor anymore and martial arts have expanded beyond use in just warfare scenarios. MMA styles are generally the newer styles that recognized this and adapted as such

Sounds like he may have simply put you in a body triangle and squeezed. Depending on how strong his legs are, and how much you did or did not panic, its very likely you simply overexerted and hypervenelated yourself. I seriously doubt he hit any "pressure points." Theres no physical evidence to suggest that hitting pressure points yields such devestating results. Against those relatively inexperienced, body triangles (as they are called) can cause them to tap out. Against more experienced fighters, a body triangle done from the guard is really a waste of time- Hit whatever pressure points you want, its not going to do anything to them, other than stall the match for a little bit

Part of throwing someone or taking them down also has to do with pentrating their base. Standing in a deep solid stance makes it very easy for your base to be offset and pentrated. A strong stance that is mobile is what is required. As such being in a deep rooted stance is very ineffective at stopping takedowns.

First off, your story of Kano is a fabrication-Kano was anything but a bully. He picked up Ju Jitsu in response to being bullied as a kid. One of the reasons he created Judo was to help reinstill the image of martial arts in Japan, namely ju jitsu. Ju Jitsu students had a habit of fighting often in public then (as they kind of do now) and had a reputation as thugs and brawlers. Kano created Judo and with it a code of honor which forbade interschool challenge matches and more or less turned it into a tournament format. As far as breaking someone's neck with a karate chop, its not going to happen, certainly not the way you're envisioning it anyways. The only circumstance in which I know of a broken neck in a fight was when Frank Shamrock fought Igor Zinoviev and slammed him to the ground. Neck breaking techniques are perfectly legal in mixed martial arts and plenty of people have taken shots to the neck in these tournaments. I would blame the whole "broken neck theory" on many 80's ninja and chuck norris movies

A horse stance wouldnt be too practical if you're attempting to defend a takedown. The whole premise of defending takedowns is to defend your hips. You've got 3 lines of defense. Your hands, your elbows, and finally your hips. Rather than trying to be in a deep stance, you should be in a mobile stance. A strong rooted stance allows for good power when striking. A mobile stance where you're light on your feet is good for sprawling and defending takedowns.