Poll: Master or Jack?

[Kirves]

If you had only two options, which one would it be: become very good in one "imperfect" martial art (imperfect meaning it doesn't cover all ranges of fighting, or is inadequate in some other way in your opinion) or become only a "Jack of all trades", that is, learn an art that you feel is realistic and covers all required ranges but you won't become very good at it.

 

Another way to put this is, would you like to be a small fish in the ocean or a big fish in the pond? A nobody in vale tudo, or champ at K1? A well known and sought after instructor of an "incomplete" art, or just one unknown face among the rest in a "complete" art?

 

I hope you get the jist of what I'm after here...

 

EDIT: Hmmm... I tried to post this as a poll but I screwed it up. Well, just reply with posts.

[AndrewGreen]

Become good at all of them, this question is rigged.

 

The "Jack of all trades, master of none" line is nonsense.

 

Sure you COULD learn the whole game of Chess, but you'd never really get good at any of it, instead you could focus on just using 2 pieces and master them.

 

Even a medicore Chess player could beat someone that only used pawns and bishops.

 

I'd rather learn the full game, its more fun. Thats all I really care about anyway

[Kirves]

The point was, if you had to choose just one art that you trained for, say 2 or three times a week (like the average hobbyist). I.e. you don't have the time to train all the ranges adequately. Would you then still train in all of them without getting that good at them, or would you focus your few hours of training at one aspect or range and get good at it?

 

Let's face it. If you want to become a submission wrestling champ, you have to train some serious hours per week in SW. If you want to become a K1 champ, you'd have to clock in some serious hours of standup fighting. If you want to learn weapons self defence, you'd better spend lots of hours in the eskrima class every week. Somebody may have the time, money and energy (and lack of life outside the dojo) to do all this, or able to become a pro, but my point is about the hobbyist who is going to invest very limited amount of time to the martial arts.

Edited June 25, 2003 by Kirves

[mikS]

Thats an easy one! I woudl definitely master ONE art than be shittyat several.

[AndrewGreen]

Training to a high level in k-1 takes no less time then training to a high level in MMA.

 

If competition is your goal train the one that you are best at and enjoy the most.

 

I think you still view MMA as being Kickboxing + Wrestling + Submission Wrestling + whatever you choose.

 

It's not, it is one system which contains elements of each.

 

So I choose to do one to, but my one contains elements of each.

 

You don't have time to learn knights, queens, kings, bishops, pawns, etc. So pick one or two and focus on them.

 

It's a silly argument, you can do all and be better overall then you would if you knew only a couple of pieces 10x better.

 

You should not train them seperate, they should be integrated into ONE complete system.

[Kirves]

It's a silly argument, you can do all and be better overall then you would if you knew only a couple of pieces 10x better.

 

You should not train them seperate, they should be integrated into ONE complete system.

 

So, basically you think that if one trains 3 hours a week, he should do it in a system that divides the three hours evenly between standup, groundfighting, trapping, weapons and fitness. That means e he gets about half an hour of standup training per week, half an hour ground grappling per week, half an hour trapping, and so on.

 

And you think he would master all the aspects better than if the student just focused the 3 hours on his standup game, or 3 hours a week groundfighting, or 3 hours a week trapping, or 3 hours a week weapons fighting, or 3 hours of fitness?

 

So, your choice was the jack of all trades, as I don't believe you will be good in any of the ranges with only half an hour per week training in it.

 

But that was the point, you either do three hours of a single range and become good at it but not learn much of the others, or you do half of hour everything and don't get that good at any of the specific ranges, or you do 3 hours a week for all the ranges and forget about having a life.

 

I deliberately left the last option away, as it would either assume you become a pro, or that you have no life besides your job and martial arts. So the choice is between getting good at one range or not very good at all of them. Your choice would seem to be learn all the ranges but not get good at them (at least in the context of this poll. Of course if you believe half an hour per week makes you a master of a range then that is another issue altogether.)

 

Remember that the whole idea behind this poll is the situation of the normal "casual hobbyist" martial artist, not a pro, or pro-wanna-be who trains hours per every day like some Bruce Lee enthusiast. The normal "family-man" hobbyist with 12-hour work shifts, three kids and all the life-crap piled up (like fixing the car, mowing the lawn, picking up kids from kindergarten, going shopping with wife and so on) it is common to only train 2-3 sessions a week, ranging from 60 to 120 minutes per session. That is not a whole lot, when you remember that in most class sessions mere fitness and conditioning take up anywhere from 30-45 minutes per class, so the actual time spent fighting and drilling is reduced to maybe 100 hours per week. Some people feel it is better to focus this little time on a single range to become good at it, some feel that this time should be used for a mixed art that divides it into chunks of 20-30 minutes per range. The poll idea here is to ask which one would you prefer, if your time was that limited.

[AndrewGreen]

I teach all ranges, it is possible to get good in all of them with that much training.

 

You will not be as good of boxer as someone that just does boxing though.

 

You will be able to get better then a boxer in ground, clinch and weapons and force him to play one of those games though.

 

Your argument is flawed.

[Kirves]

You will not be as good of boxer as someone that just does boxing though.

 

Exactly. You will not be a master of boxing tech like the boxer, but only a jack of all trades.

You will be able to get better then a boxer in ground, clinch and weapons and force him to play one of those games though.

 

But not because you had mastered any one of the ranges, only because you were able to take him to a range he was even less familiar than you.

 

And btw it is not guaranteed you will take him down from the boxing range. Because he is better at that range, he just might drop you before you get the fight to advance to a range more suitable to your strategy. It can go either way...

Your argument is flawed.

 

Then how come your arguments reinforce my point?

 

I might also add that you seem to (deliberately or by accident?) misunderstand my whole point. The point (again and again repeating) of this poll is which would you chooce, not which one is the best. I don't like discussing what martial art is the best or whatever. Just like to know would the people here rather be a well known master and always-sold-out instructor of a single range, or an average joe of a mixed art. The point here was not which one would beat the other one up on the street, just to ask which one would you rather be?

[AndrewGreen]

It doesn't.

 

You still don't seem to understand that it is not 3 seperate things, it is one thing which takes place in all three.

 

Should a boxer only do a jab so that he can master that instead of being a "jack of all punches"

 

Should a wrestler learn only one double leg takedowns?

 

A submission guy only how to fight in a mount?

 

It takes no more time to master MMA then it does to master boxing.

[Kirves]

Again I repeat: The point of this poll is which would you chooce, not which one is the best. Would the people here rather be a well known master and always-sold-out instructor of a single range, or an average joe of a mixed art.

It takes no more time to master MMA then it does to master boxing.

 

And to your claim that it takes no more time... Well, I have seen people master TKD in a couple of years training 3 hours per week total. So can I master MMA in that time too? Another way to explain this: if it takes me one minute to learn one thing. Then learning 10 things takes 10 minutes. If I have 10 minutes time, how many things can I learn in that time? 10. If we change the 10 things to a 1000 things. How many minutes will it take for me to learn them all? A 1000 minutes. Now you claim that it takes no more time to learn the 1000 things than the 10 things. If we assume boxing has apprx. 10 techniques, and MMA has 1000, then you see what I'm getting at.

 

"Mastery" here doesn't refer to as being a mystical martial arts master sage. Here it merely means, you have learned all the techniques up to an instructor-level (black belt for example, or an instructor certificate) and seem to hold your own in the respective tournaments. Thus my point is, no-one gets good at MMA tournaments by training 3 hours per week for a couple of years. But in some arts you can become the national champ in such time frame. And trying to repeat the point of this thread again: which one would you rather be: the MMA guy who isn't good enough to win any of the MMA events, or the single-art guy that wins trophies and gets paid a lot to hold seminars and training camps. The small fish in the ocean or the big fish in the pond...

Edited June 25, 2003 by Kirves