Rewatch Kimo Leopoldo vs Dan Severn in Pride Fc1

JakePaulMMA said:
Royce applying the submission and yanking handfuls of Kimo's hair.

Kimo struggling carrying that stupid fucking cross to the cage was pretty funny too.
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I believe the organisers didn't know he was doing it. He had the cross in a big case and told them all it was training equipment as he brought it in to the venue.
 
mkt said:
That was an odd time, because you had judo/JJ/wrestling coaches trying to adapt to the early UFCs and Gracie JJ, as it was called at the time. John Saylor was another name I heard a lot then, along with Tony Cecchine (catch wrestling). While Cecchine got bashed a lot later, I'm guessing he knew more about submissions than 99.999% of the population did in, say, 1994.

I went to a local judo/JJ school that was quickly adapting to MMA (even some of the striking) around 1994-95.
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I’m from Detroit.
The BJJ scene was super lacking when I moved away in 07.
 
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JakePaulMMA said:
Kimo struggling carrying that stupid fucking cross to the cage was pretty funny too.
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And Kimo (a high school wrestler and football player) still almost beat a guy who trained BJJ since he was a toddler and was supposed to dominate the UFC for years because "no one beats the Gracies and size doesn't matter!" Even after exhausting himself by carrying a huge cross to the cage. That was a wake-up call to the Gracies and the beginning of the end of Royce's reign. Good stuff.
 
mkt said:
And Kimo (a high school wrestler and football player) still almost beat a guy who trained BJJ since he was a toddler and was supposed to dominate the UFC for years because "no one beats the Gracies and size doesn't matter!" Even after exhausting himself by carrying a huge cross to the cage. That was a wake-up call to the Gracies and the beginning of the end of Royce's reign. Good stuff.
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Dude was Roided the max.

Point still stands, though.
 
Dan Severn is a legend and dude was fighting well into his 50s for years back then. Tearing it up on the regional scene. Massive respect for Dan Severn and those older generation fighters for sure. They paved the way for what we watch today and the UFC thanks them zero.
 
mkt said:
And Kimo (a high school wrestler and football player) still almost beat a guy who trained BJJ since he was a toddler and was supposed to dominate the UFC for years because "no one beats the Gracies and size doesn't matter!" Even after exhausting himself by carrying a huge cross to the cage. That was a wake-up call to the Gracies and the beginning of the end of Royce's reign. Good stuff.
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For years there was this rumor that someone paid Rickson Gracie for private lessons so he can rely those techniques to Kimo. The Gracies were oblivious to this until they crossed paths with that guy at UFC 3 and a brawl nearly ensued.
Well, this year it was confirmed that this happened
 
uchubaco said:
For years there was this rumor that someone paid Rickson Gracie for private lessons so he can rely those techniques to Kimo. The Gracies were oblivious to this until they crossed paths with that guy at UFC 3 and a brawl nearly ensued.
Well, this year it was confirmed that this happened
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Any link to show this was confirmed? An interview or statement with Rickson?

Back in the mid-90s, the rumor was that Kimo trained briefly with that Machados before the fight. That's possible, especially if he didn't tell him his plans to enter the UFC. But the Gracies were super stingy about training other fighters. It basically led the brawl between Tank and Alan Goes and another BJJ guy (I forget who) got in hot water for training Kimo a couple of years after the Royce fight.

I never heard any more about it, though. Kimo was no submission expert at the time, but had more awareness and grappling technique than you'd expect for an untrained guy in 1994. Like I said, he was a high school wrestler but we saw much more decorated wrestlers like Kevin Jackson and Hendo (both former Olympians) get submitted much faster by Frank Shamrock than Kimo was by Royce.
 
It wasn’t a great fight. And they had other options?
 
mkt said:
Any link to show this was confirmed? An interview or statement with Rickson?

Back in the mid-90s, the rumor was that Kimo trained briefly with that Machados before the fight. That's possible, especially if he didn't tell him his plans to enter the UFC. But the Gracies were super stingy about training other fighters. It basically led the brawl between Tank and Alan Goes and another BJJ guy (I forget who) got in hot water for training Kimo a couple of years after the Royce fight.

I never heard any more about it, though. Kimo was no submission expert at the time, but had more awareness and grappling technique than you'd expect for an untrained guy in 1994. Like I said, he was a high school wrestler but we saw much more decorated wrestlers like Kevin Jackson and Hendo (both former Olympians) get submitted much faster by Frank Shamrock than Kimo was by Royce.
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There is a Podcast, Lytes Out, in which they interviewed Chris Brennan and Todd Medina, both of them knew and trained with Kimo at the time and confirmed it did happen and Fabiano Iha, who was a part of the Gracie team at the time, alluded that it was some sort of issue during UFC 3 with the Gracies and some people. The Gracies would never confirm is anything like this happened because of their pride
 
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uchubaco said:
There is a Podcast, Lytes Out, in which they interviewed Chris Brennan and Todd Medina, both of them knew and trained with Kimo at the time and confirmed it did happen and Fabiano Iha, who was a part of the Gracie team at the time, alluded that it was some sort of issue during UFC 3 with the Gracies and some people. The Gracies would never confirm is anything like this happened because of their pride
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Todd Medina--now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time. I believe he was billed as a JKD fighter.
 
suprah said:
Dan I think was one of the reasons I stopped watching UFC back in the 90s it was alot of laying on people. Royce was another. I think if Marco had been in the first ones Royce wouldnt have the reputation he does now.
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You don't sound like you watched the early UFCs; that was the time there was the least LNP up until UFC 11. Most of the matches were fast. There were far fewer long boring fights than there would be later. Out of Royce's 12 UFC fights, 2 were long- they resulted in a finish and a draw; the rest were fast submissions or GNP wins. He defeated Kimo, Shamrock, and Severn by finish; he deserves his place. Ruas was a one-timer in a UFC that had a much weaker group of fighters; maybe he would and maybe he wouldn't beat Gracie; Ruas lost to a worse fighter at Pride 4.

Kimo vs Severn is a weird fight to bring up; that's the kind of fight that makes people not want to watch MMA. There were a whole lot of far more interesting fights in Pride, including the very early days.
 
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mkt said:
I thnk that fight might have been rigged or the fighters were forced into some weird agreement. In other fights, Severn and Kimo both liked to grapple like 95% of the time. Yet they stood and had a weak point fight? And while neither were great strikers, Kimo landed a big shot on prime Bob Sapp and almost finished him. It's hard to believe a couple of strong 240-260 pound guys couldn't at least stun each other (if not a KO), even if it's just a wild shot.
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Both fighters are large men physically. When you do not take chances fights can play out like that though
 
suprah said:
Dan I think was one of the reasons I stopped watching UFC back in the 90s it was alot of laying on people. Royce was another. I think if Marco had been in the first ones Royce wouldnt have the reputation he does now.
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Of course not. It was to showcase what it can do against someone untrained, not one of the baddest men in Brazil trained in everything.
 
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