Do you find that when you watch any of these events that the fighters seem poorly skilled overall.
Undoubtedly, there are fighters in these events that are very good fighters, striking and grappling.
But overall, do you see a lot of bad form in uhb nhb type competitions?
or
Do you think these events are the pinnacle of martial arts today and the fighters are mostly good?
what do you think?
peace
Kung Lek, are you talking just NHB stuff, or are you talking ALL competitions??
Now a days all the big events have really good fighters. The reason the form looks off is due to the speed of the competion. I have a pretty good shot but when it came down to the high speed of the fight i took a straight roundhouse kick to the head cause of the nature of instincts kicking in before reasoning.
I’m talking about competitions wherein the combat is full contact.
Much like a boxing match, where you see excellent form in the fighters quite often, or at least 80+% of the time.
I am not refering to forms competitions or point sparring.
While these latter types of competitions have purpose, full contact ring fighting is one step above point sparring and one step below street altercations in the spectrum of realistic use of a martial art. imho
peace
But would it really be considered bad form if it got the job done and you were the one who walked away the victor/survivor.
By that I mean if the punch that knocked the guy out was a bit sloppy but it still knocked the guy out, is it still considered bad form?
It’s relative to what the venue says the venue will be.
peace
Kung Lek,
Boxing has a high level of skill, true… but I might point out that there are different sorts of boxers out there that have been very successful:
Rocky Marciano was clearly less pretty to watch than Ali. Both were great fighters
Watch Sakuraba, and you see a pretty slick style. Watch Couture and you’ll see an equally effective, but somewhat more ‘blocky’ type of style. Not as slick, but certainly equally as effective.
I would say the reason that NHB stuff looks ugly sometimes is because fights are ugly. Footwork, bob and weave, etc, which is so pretty and neat to look at in boxing, will get you kneed in the face and taken down in an MMA fight. Because of this, the “slickness,” of some things is less apparent, and it’s just not as pretty to look at.
Unfortunately, we confuse “slick looking,” with “skill,” rather frequently in the MA world, when skilled is actually “being good at what works for you.” A skilled ‘ground and pound,’ isn’t slick looking, but certainly requires a certain set of martial skills.
ground and pound seems more “desperate” than “skilled”.
for instance, if you applied the methods of grace employed in boxing to the entirity of your arsenal, would this not produce a fighter that had holistic skill and could still make an “ugly fight” something that you can watch and go “ahhhhh, I see that” as opposed to “ahhhhh, did you see that!”.
see what i’m sayin? 
luck is too big a factor in the semi pro venues, the fights are ugly because the fighters fight ugly.
I’ve seen K1 fights that exhibted great skill in martial arts. Granted, both these types of martial competition have rules applied to them, even when they say they are “no holds barred” and “ultimate” and “no rules” there are rules at play, but the K1 fighters go through a lot to rank into the comps they hold.
I’ve seen a lot of -not quite there- fighters getting in the ring in a good deal of the mma matches out there.
And yes, I do think that there are pretty good fighters in all venues really, to me, it just seems that there are more poor fighters in the sensationalist bouts.
peace
well it all depends on what the MMA guy specializes in, many wrestlers use the ground and pound simply because they are great at takedowns and gaining a good position, learn some rudimentry striking and you got an effective style.
I often see the lack of grace in MMA but that’s usually in the standup, i’m hoping this will change in the next 3-5 years, i’ve yet to see a VERY good kicker in MMA, i’ve seen a highlight video from a guy that was really good at kicking and i heard he’ll be entering pride soon so we might be seeing some great kicking in a major event there. You often see some good boxing in MMA events but as pointed out before you gotta be extra careful when boxing because you’ll get taken down, if someone is owning you on the feet he tries to go to the clinch and take him down, i think Vitor Belfort is a good example of a good boxer in MMA. Then of course the former topten boxer Stephen Oullet recently started MMA, only has one fight under his belt but that was a KO in 10 seconds. Reason for seeing more boxing then kicking is propably that it takes longer to get good at kicking and feel comfortable kicking at all ranges whilest most people are used to conventional boxing and it doesnt take long for them to get the basics down and improve from there. This is propably the reason you see leg kicks all the time in MMA but the same people often never throw mid/high kicks. It’s simple you dont need a lot of skill/flexibility to do low kicks.
Overall i love watching MMA, and yes i think it’s a good representation of “real” fighting and shows who’s the most skilled. I love the video of when Jon Hess fights Vitor Belfort. Jon Hess claiming that he can beat anyone under a REAL no rules combat (eye gouges and stuff). Vitor beat the guy into a bloody pulp.
I know what you mean by “not quite there”. For that i will use Heath Herring as an example, the guy is a monster and gets results, but his striking is ugly as hell! Jesus i cant beleave he’s beaten so many guys by striking.
Then there are fighters that seem to be pretty complete overall, Nogeira comes to mind, greatest heavyweight submission guy and he beat both #1 contenders both in striking and on the gruond. I like Igor Vovchanchyn a lot too, even though he’s not a grappling master he’s **** good at staying off the ground and employing his will standing.
Btw since you mentioned K-1 fighters a lot of them have tried to migrate into MMA and not many have been succesful, only one i can remember right now is Mirco “Cro Cop”.
Frankly, I think these home-grown competitions do give a decent overview of what kinds of fighters are in your neighborhood. --And they’re usually poorly skilled, out of shape WWF wannabes or street thugs who have found a venue to beat up on someone within the bounds of the law. But the techniques observed at these regional bouts aren’t anything to sway this MA’s opinion one way or the other, no matter who participates: KF, karate, rasslers, dog catchers, etc. They’re mostly all pretty bad and from what I’ve seen on amateur videos most of us who train regularly and solemnly in MA dont have too much to worry about if we’re ever jumped by one of these beer-bellied wife-slapping hog-kissing cousin-marrying goons.
Obviously, the topmost tier showcasing these events don’t have the same lack of skill exhibited by their practitioners. Just their fan base.
My two yen.
If you are looking at anything that if full contact, have you ever attented a TKD tournament or seen one on t.v perhaps?
well, some fighters make it look really bad, but many of them are in fact very very good and strike with precision and power, and im quite sure that if applied out on the street in self defence will also work.
So in this sense, yes, they are realistic.
But i can see, where you might have doubt. Some fighters (specifically in TKD) have no idea what there doing on that mat infront of spectators and judges. They lose sense of fighting skill because their fear overcomes them. Yes I am speaking from exp. But when you learn to control or accept your fear, believe me you improve. ALOT.
Many fighters make it look unworthy and certainly not realistic when fighting in comps, but dont think that they cant actually be good ‘outside’. They can. Not all of them though. It really does depend on the individual.
Tae Li
Kung Lek - I don’t understand how you can say ‘ground and pound’ is inherently sloppy. I don’t see how any technique can inherently be sloppy. It’s about HOW things are done, not WHAT is done.
Black Jack - Mostly you’re right; ‘beauty’ in martial arts IS what works. In the same way that mathematicians might remark that a formula is ‘beautiful’ because it efficiently handles the problem. That said, at least when I think poorly of the skill shown by some professional MMAists, my reasoning is - yes, it works for them, but does that really mean it works? There are some problems in extrapolating what works for Silva to what is going to work for joe average, and what is going to work for me (the last of which is really all I care about). Most of us don’t have the genetics of those Big Scary Mofos ™, nor the ability to put in the work out time and diets they have; and there is a whole bundle of concerns regarding steroid use and the like. So when you take people whose physical makeup is entirely different than ours, how valid are the conclusions you can draw from them? When I see people who MMAists consider highly skilled, but who have no control over their center, I think to myself - works for them, would never work for me. This is when the issue of showing skill comes in.
In regards to the original question, I think you can’t generalize - the people involved in these events runs the gamut. There are those who look incredibly skilled to me, and those who look incredibly unskilled. As there would be for any other group of people.
I think that if there are spectators, then the competition is a spectator sport that requires somewhat different skills and training than basic self defence. Kind of like apples and oranges.
I like Braden’s comments about body size, taking conclusions from fighters with pretty much the opposite body type from you.
Makes sense. But I can’t offer an answer to the question because I haven’t seen any.
It can be viewed both ways.. i think anyone who fights fullcontact does something good you know? Coz hes out there and really testing the stuff. but i can think that hmm, that taekwando.. I wouldn’t wanna use that on the streets, in a real fight. Even if they fight fullcontact. And somethimes when u see a really sloppy boxer, i can think that.. Hey, if he had to box anyone without gloves, he would brake that hand before he knew it. Both are still good, but all Im saying is that u can thik of the question in many directions, so too speak.
But how many MA who watch these competitions, and think the competiters are bad, could get into the same ring/octagon and win themselves? And if these comps are not good places to judge martial skill, than how do you know the competitors are bad martial artists or not?
Kung,
I hardly consider taking somebody down and beating their face in desperate. If you are interested in the asthetics of the situation, then a ring is not for you. It’s ugly, it’s bloody, and the fewer restrictions there are on techniques the less inherently cool it looks, because flash is risky. High kicks in a TKD comp might look cool, but start adding leg kicks to the equation and you’ll get something that looks FAR more like a muay thai match, which many people on this forum consider artless and brutal.
However, I definitely agree with you on one of your points: The local level fights seem to attract a lot of people who shouldn’t be there… grossly overweight fighters, people who’ve never trained properly… one guy actually TURNED HIS BACK to his opponent and went back to his corner the first time he got whacked. Pathetic. His trainer should be SHOT for allowing him to get in the ring.
“if you applied the methods of grace employed in boxing to the entirity of your arsenal, would this not produce a fighter that had holistic skill”
what the heck does that mean???
BlackJack,
I know what’ you’re saying. If the guy can pull it off, but it looks ugly, it’s still effective, but if they throw out a butt ugly desparation shot that they really can’t repeat in a similar situation, that just reeks of “luck” which in my eyes is the x factor, that makes may techniques “ugly”. I wouldn’t consider them effective (because you can’t rely on their effectivness when you need it), but I would consider them a danger that you always have to watch out for. Like the mighty “one shot kill” from most karate styles.
Kung Lek,
a lot of the big name fighters in today’s major MMA events have either cleaned up their style, or they’ve always had a certain level of grace. If you ever watch Rickson Gracie fight, he gets hit a lot, and he’s just as vulnerable to the KO, or submissions as anyone else, but the way he can flow to take advantage of a mistake is a thing of beauty. It’s not asthetically pleasing to see him punch the back of someone’s head when he’s got the back mount, but when you realize that he’s doing it to open them up for a choke, then he easily takes the choke, that’s skill in my eyes.
Sakuraba is another example, but I consider his skill to be more like “unpredictable beauty”. It’s just too weird to even consider half the stuff he uses (he uses strikes and subs from pro wrestling sometimes), but he can make them work when he wants to, so that’s skill. Another is Mark Coleman, I don’t know if you saw his early “shoot ‘n’ punch” matches, but that was very ugly to me. Since is three loss streak, he’s really cleaned up his style, and develope a lot (I mean A LOT) more patience, and respect for the sport and the fighters involved. He’s got one of the nicest takedowns in the sport today (besides Mark Kerr, who’s probably got the best IMO). He either shoots for a double, or moves for a clinch, and sweeps the legs out from the other guy, but when he takes an advantageous position, he picks his shots carefully now. He hits hard, but he only hits when there’s a shot to be taken now.
BTW, I hear Coture really cleaned his strikes up. His last fight against Rizzo sounded like a very impressive showing that I’m gonna have to check out.
OK, so now here’s my little confession…I like watching Guy Mezger fight. He’s got some nice strikes, plus he leads with his left foot (if you’ve ever seen him fight recently, that’s pretty much what my striking looks like. I use my lead left foot for a lot of roundhouse, and side kicks, except I switch stances, as well as use my right leg), but he doesn’t have the best record around. His strikes are clean and sharp, but they lack the power, and aggression that someone like Silva has (who TKO’d Mezger in the first round).
Fighting in the ring is good as it can give you an indication on how your skills will work against an unwilling opponnent. I do however have a little problem with the “realistic” part. In a NHB type event, fighters go into a ring knowing they are about to fight. When your standing in a bar laughing with your friends and all of a sudden some angry biker grabs you by the shirt, gets in your face and starts shouting somthing like “Im gonna kill you for what you did to my sister mother fukker”, and cracks you in the nose, you simply are not going to start contemplating the different techniques you might use on this very ****sed off person. Conditioning yourself to react to fear (mentally) can be as challenging as any physical part of training.