MMA has NOT evolved!

[Dont Frye]

American rules always favoured the wrestler too much.

That's what killed it.

 

[YellowBanenoo]

I'm sure prime Royce Graciee would sub everyone in current WW.

 

[shortlefthook]

perfect example.

Fighting since 2002, and well out of his prime and yet still can compete at the top levels.

Except for gsp litterally says himself that the game is constantly evolving and he's still learning every day as a Martial artist.

And athletes being more cross trained by definition is a evolution of the sport, the competition has become more complete therefore the competition has evolved therefore the sport has evolved.
Pretty simple

 

[JBJISGOAT]

LW-LHW has evolved a TON...anybody that says otherwise has vested bias.

HW has ALWAYS been trash, big dudes with athleticism play real sports for real money.

 

[JackSchtotll]

tl;tr but somewhat correct.

 

[Towelie by TKO]

While the heavier weight classes may not have evolved much, the same cannot be said about the lighter weight classes.

Fighters like Dillashaw, Cruz, Garbrandt, Ferguson, Khabib, Holloway, etc. posses far more evolved skill sets than the fighters of the PRIDE era.

Holloway would have absolutely destroyed "prime" Gomi.

 

[VIPERdude]

In any thread where someone brings up a top fighter from years back and how they would match up in a Prime V Prime against a top fighter today we invariably get a very reflexive reply that the fighter from years back would lose because the sports Evolved as if that and that alone would determine the outcome.

I am here to argue that the sport has not had any significant evolution and far more important is how good an athlete and how good a fighter that person was.

What has evolved is training as all fighters now are far better cross trained and there are less easy fights against one dimensional and part time fighters. That evolution I will concede but that was never an issue for the top guys V top guys. That is more an issue for the guys in the ranks.

This New Breed, sports evolved nonsense was first being spouted and adopted when the major HW's were split. The UFC had a crop of mostly new and younger HW's and Strikeforce had a stable of mostly older HW's whose prime years were either behind them or fading fast. The UFC wanted to glorify their New Breed by saying the Sports Evolved and all those older guys may have great resumes and name recognition but they could never compete with our new young guns. Many fans bought into that marketing spin and still parrot it today.

We now know after those HW divisions were merged that, that was BS and not only could that old guard compete but they quickly took over a major portion of the top ranks, even HW's who were considered well past their prime runs were still able to maintain at or near the top.

And I get it as invariably fans will rank 'what they watch and see today' and they find themselves vested in as they cheer for one guy over the other, over stories they have heard about older fighters or in watching them in re-runs. Its not the same when it comes to how vested you are in a fighter. But that does not make what you see today necessarily better than what happened yesterday. You need to step back from that bias as there is no new breed and the sport has not evolved yet. Training has.

Edit addition:

Spoiler

i guess i should be more clear as i already stated that the training has evolved. The money has also evolved which is drawing in more athletes who can train and work full time in MMA where that was not possible prior. And I stated that has strengthened the tiers below the elite fighters pretty significantly.

But WHAT I AM REFERRING TO is that the level of athletes at the top, who have mostly always had good access to cross training have not evolved in such a way that you can say it would be no contest between a top star or yesteryear and a top star today.


(and no I am not going back to the earliest days of the UFC when most of the athletes were hand picked to fight for a reason)

USADA set UFC specifically back about 7 years

I agree with lot of what you said I just cant think of many fighters from the old guard that did come back that were victorious over a newer younger name. ie Jens Pulver, BJ penn, Shamrock, Ortiz etc. They all were still able to compete and didn't do well. Most stars of yesteryear were one dimensional up until about 2005 fighters started to become well versed in everything. A one dimensional fighter just wont have much success today. Even Cro Cop came in UFC still very healthy and had last won the grand prix before PRIDE was bought by UFC. He was beaten by younger more well rounded talent like we never seen Cro Cop beaten before.

When you say what we see today doesnt necessarily mean its better than what happened yesterday.. That may be true but you really cant scale that because it just doesnt happen ENOUGH in order to really know.

 

[Guile]

training methods and ways to cut weight have improved. Could say that over time we have seen which techniques are more well suited for mma when it comes to BJJ, wrestling, kickboxing etc.

 

[rurouni]

 

[VIPERdude]

View attachment 348383

Ronda was just a woman Tank Abbot with an Olympic Judo background.

 

[SirKratos]

Name one guy you would be comfortable picking over a prime cro cop in the stand-up Department.

Prime JDS
Ubereem
Current Miocic

So basically all the elite HW strikers of post 2010

 

[VIPERdude]

training methods and ways to cut weight have improved. Could say that over time we have seen which techniques are more well suited for mma when it comes to BJJ, wrestling, kickboxing etc.

Meh....cutting weight has improved? I see more people going to the hospital now than ever before from poor weight cutting

 

[chaos_36]

You caveat your premise by saying it's the training methods that have evolved not the fighters per se. Do you not see that's the reason the fighters have evolved? Training, recovery, nutrition, athleticism etc etc have all improved greatly. In fact fighters have evolved so much now that you could send a Lightweight like Khabib to the first couple of UFCs and he'd demolish everyone fairly easily, maybe even someone lighter like Aldo.

 

[VIPERdude]

Prime JDS
Ubereem
Current Miocic

So basically all the elite HW strikers of post 2010

GABRIEL GONZAGA

Look I love Cro Cop he was my favorite fighter in Pride but he was NOT out of his prime when he first came to the UFC. He had just won the last PRIDE Grand Prix for God sakes

 

[sonofjay817]

In any thread where someone brings up a top fighter from years back and how they would match up in a Prime V Prime against a top fighter today we invariably get a very reflexive reply that the fighter from years back would lose because the sports Evolved as if that and that alone would determine the outcome.

I am here to argue that the sport has not had any significant evolution and far more important is how good an athlete and how good a fighter that person was.

What has evolved is training as all fighters now are far better cross trained and there are less easy fights against one dimensional and part time fighters. That evolution I will concede but that was never an issue for the top guys V top guys. That is more an issue for the guys in the ranks.

This New Breed, sports evolved nonsense was first being spouted and adopted when the major HW's were split. The UFC had a crop of mostly new and younger HW's and Strikeforce had a stable of mostly older HW's whose prime years were either behind them or fading fast. The UFC wanted to glorify their New Breed by saying the Sports Evolved and all those older guys may have great resumes and name recognition but they could never compete with our new young guns. Many fans bought into that marketing spin and still parrot it today.

We now know after those HW divisions were merged that, that was BS and not only could that old guard compete but they quickly took over a major portion of the top ranks, even HW's who were considered well past their prime runs were still able to maintain at or near the top.

And I get it as invariably fans will rank 'what they watch and see today' and they find themselves vested in as they cheer for one guy over the other, over stories they have heard about older fighters or in watching them in re-runs. Its not the same when it comes to how vested you are in a fighter. But that does not make what you see today necessarily better than what happened yesterday. You need to step back from that bias as there is no new breed and the sport has not evolved yet. Training has.

Edit addition:

Spoiler

i guess i should be more clear as i already stated that the training has evolved. The money has also evolved which is drawing in more athletes who can train and work full time in MMA where that was not possible prior. And I stated that has strengthened the tiers below the elite fighters pretty significantly.

But WHAT I AM REFERRING TO is that the level of athletes at the top, who have mostly always had good access to cross training have not evolved in such a way that you can say it would be no contest between a top star or yesteryear and a top star today.


(and no I am not going back to the earliest days of the UFC when most of the athletes were hand picked to fight for a reason)

I sort of agree with you but not entirely. I feel sure you would agree it has evolved since the very first UFC's. That is painfully obvious. I assume you mean maybe since the era of gloves and the additional rules that were implemented in order to get sanctioned in more states. I have thought for a while that the degree of evolution has been overstated. Vitor Belfort is a good illustration of someone who competed close to the beginning and has been relevant up until very recently...and my personal opinion is that 19 year old Belfort was better than TRTitor yet the latter was very recently striking fear in the very top of the ranks and came very close to defeating Jon Jones himself. All that being said, I do think its apparent that evolution is happening, but not on the scale some like to claim; not to the point that the old guard couldn't compete at the top with today's field. As far as I can tell, there's more of a consistency of talent now. Fifteen years ago you had outliers way ahead of everyone else and today there is much more parity. I believe the best today is marginally better than the best of yesteryear.

 

[sonofjay817]

GABRIEL GONZAGA

Look I love Cro Cop he was my favorite fighter in Pride but he was NOT out of his prime when he first came to the UFC. He had just won the last PRIDE Grand Prix for God sakes

I think he mistakenly thought he had to be unenhanced to fight in the UFC and that was his undoing along with Wanderlei.

 

[Guile]

Meh....cutting weight has improved? I see more people going to the hospital now than ever before from poor weight cutting

Cutting weight was barely even a thing back in the day... You look at how massive some guys are in weight classes and that just wasnt a thing years ago.. BJ penn when he was LW champ or WW champ wouldve been dwarfed by the guys of today.

 

[sonofjay817]

Ronda was just a woman Tank Abbot with an Olympic Judo background.

Tank had a better attitude.

 

[smellmyfarts]

. Even at LHW, where is this evolution aside from DC, Gus, Jones and maybe Rumble? Everyone else sucks.

Everyone else doesn't suck. There are just a few guys that are better than everyone else like there always is in any division in any era.

DC, Gus, and Jones would destroy Tito, Chuck, and Randy just like Oezdemir, Texteira, and Manua would destroy fighters like Even Tanner, Jeremy Horn, or Jason Lambert.

You kids are fucking nuts.........THE SPORT HAS EVOLVED

 

[VIPERdude]

Cutting weight was barely even a thing back in the day... You look at how massive some guys are in weight classes and that just wasnt a thing years ago.. BJ penn when he was LW champ or WW champ wouldve been dwarfed by the guys of today.

true