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You sound real neutral.
What's your opinion on striking coaches that never fought before?
- Thread starter kenpeters8
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I can answer the question directly, but there is literally nothing I can add that Shin and Sinister haven't already stated.
Would I still "talk shit" if one of my guys was "knocked the fuck out" by a kid who was coached by someone who never fought? A few things:
I haven't "talked shit" about coaches in general. The one exception was "coaches who aren't preparing fighters for competition". Those individuals indeed garner exactly zero respect from me as they're not striking coaches and it borders on insulting that they pretend to belong to that group.
The terms "talk shit" and "knocked the fuck out" almost immediately indicate to me that you don't compete in combat sport as literally no one talks like that. I would never say one of my guys knocked another guy "the fuck out", but I could tell you that they looked great in a fight where they won by 3rd round stoppage. I have an incredible amount of respect for those who compete in the sport as I PERSONALLY know the struggles and sacrifices needed to be made to make that ring walk. It's a very demanding sport, and when you lose, also a lonely one. I wouldn't disrespected a fighter in that way.
As Sinister had said previously, once the bell rings, all bets are off. Best camp, perfect preparations, everything leading up to the fight going 100% your way, never guarantees a victory. If it did, we wouldn't need to fight, there would never be upsets, and we'd declare a winner the day before a match. Anyone with two hands and breathing can beat anyone else on this Earth on any given day. The likelihood and probability can be skewed toward on fighter or another, but nothing is for certain.
At the end of every bout, our fighter walks over and gives respect to the opposing corner, their fighter does the same to us, we look across and give the "thumbs up" to the opposing corner, and we wait for a decision. Regardless who is across the ring from us, and regardless of my personal history with that gym or individual, the routine is always the same. So to answer your question directly, I never would have talked shit about them in the first place, so my opinion of them wouldn't change regardless of the decision.
Now, coming full circle, I'll address the original post as I have numerous times before, and as Shin has said perfectly in this thread countless times now.
Can someone be a good coach without having fought? My answer, as it's always been, is yes, but they're are exceedingly rare as an overwhelming majority of successful coaches have fought, and with good reason. There are things that you experience in preparation, competition, and post competition that are truly unreproducible if you haven't personally lived it.
I'll end with one more example to make my point of rules vs exceptions:
Evan Tanner.
One of my favorite fighters of all time, I had the pleasure of eating lunch with Evan and his girlfriend before his fight with Phil Baroni at UFC 45 (they sat a table away from me and my friends and we talked for a good 20 minutes).
Evan never really belonged to a fighter stable, often traveling from gym to gym to train. He literally taught himself how to grapple by watching Gracie instructional videos, and at one time had more wins by triangle choke than ANY other fighter to compete in MMA.
Struggling with incredible personal demons and bouts of depression coupled with alcohol abuse, Evan later went on to become the UFC Middleweight Champion.
If someone started a thread "Could someone train in their garage, learn how to grapple from instructional videos, never fully belong to a fight camp, struggle with severe alcoholism, and still become UFC champion?", I could easily poke into that thread and say:
"Two words: Evan Tanner"
Just because something HAS happened doesn't mean it is even remotely close to being considered a norm. Again, go to ANY local advancing tournament and put some eyes on local coaches. Most are going to have something in common, and that something is that they laced them up, tossed in a mouth piece, and they put it on the line in front of a paying audience who cheered for their blood.
Would I still "talk shit" if one of my guys was "knocked the fuck out" by a kid who was coached by someone who never fought? A few things:
I haven't "talked shit" about coaches in general. The one exception was "coaches who aren't preparing fighters for competition". Those individuals indeed garner exactly zero respect from me as they're not striking coaches and it borders on insulting that they pretend to belong to that group.
The terms "talk shit" and "knocked the fuck out" almost immediately indicate to me that you don't compete in combat sport as literally no one talks like that. I would never say one of my guys knocked another guy "the fuck out", but I could tell you that they looked great in a fight where they won by 3rd round stoppage. I have an incredible amount of respect for those who compete in the sport as I PERSONALLY know the struggles and sacrifices needed to be made to make that ring walk. It's a very demanding sport, and when you lose, also a lonely one. I wouldn't disrespected a fighter in that way.
As Sinister had said previously, once the bell rings, all bets are off. Best camp, perfect preparations, everything leading up to the fight going 100% your way, never guarantees a victory. If it did, we wouldn't need to fight, there would never be upsets, and we'd declare a winner the day before a match. Anyone with two hands and breathing can beat anyone else on this Earth on any given day. The likelihood and probability can be skewed toward on fighter or another, but nothing is for certain.
At the end of every bout, our fighter walks over and gives respect to the opposing corner, their fighter does the same to us, we look across and give the "thumbs up" to the opposing corner, and we wait for a decision. Regardless who is across the ring from us, and regardless of my personal history with that gym or individual, the routine is always the same. So to answer your question directly, I never would have talked shit about them in the first place, so my opinion of them wouldn't change regardless of the decision.
Now, coming full circle, I'll address the original post as I have numerous times before, and as Shin has said perfectly in this thread countless times now.
Can someone be a good coach without having fought? My answer, as it's always been, is yes, but they're are exceedingly rare as an overwhelming majority of successful coaches have fought, and with good reason. There are things that you experience in preparation, competition, and post competition that are truly unreproducible if you haven't personally lived it.
I'll end with one more example to make my point of rules vs exceptions:
Evan Tanner.
One of my favorite fighters of all time, I had the pleasure of eating lunch with Evan and his girlfriend before his fight with Phil Baroni at UFC 45 (they sat a table away from me and my friends and we talked for a good 20 minutes).
Evan never really belonged to a fighter stable, often traveling from gym to gym to train. He literally taught himself how to grapple by watching Gracie instructional videos, and at one time had more wins by triangle choke than ANY other fighter to compete in MMA.
Struggling with incredible personal demons and bouts of depression coupled with alcohol abuse, Evan later went on to become the UFC Middleweight Champion.
If someone started a thread "Could someone train in their garage, learn how to grapple from instructional videos, never fully belong to a fight camp, struggle with severe alcoholism, and still become UFC champion?", I could easily poke into that thread and say:
"Two words: Evan Tanner"
Just because something HAS happened doesn't mean it is even remotely close to being considered a norm. Again, go to ANY local advancing tournament and put some eyes on local coaches. Most are going to have something in common, and that something is that they laced them up, tossed in a mouth piece, and they put it on the line in front of a paying audience who cheered for their blood.
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It's a bit of both. It feels like fighting for your life I'll give you that. But it's still a sport/game & a degree of fighting for your life. Arize summed it up pretty nicely for me.
It doesn't take anything away from those, that go through that. I've been in camps and tournament preparations & seen the hell training partners go through in the build up to a competition and the injuries they sustain afterwards. Of course it's not the same as actually being in there and to some degree it is fighting for your life.
The reason it's still a sport/game is because to some degree the rules are designed to provide entertainment whilst protecting those that compete from serious injury or death - though unfortunately this still happens every now and then. The consequences in the ring are more extreme than other sports and I think anyone saying otherwise is being stupid.
But it's not the same as fighting for your life in the truest sense of the word where there is significantly increased probability of death and if you do survive PTSD or greater probability of life altering injuries.
Something that comes to mind is one of my uncles closest friends. Went to Bosnia to fight during the genocide in his early 20's. Within a few months he had been killed. Never returned home. I think those are the consequences of fighting for your life in the truest sense of the word. Greater outcome of your number getting called up in a situation where there are no rules and entertainment confining you.
I agree most other sports don't include fighting for your life as part of it - so in that way fighting or combat sports is unique in that regard.
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At the end of the day it's you taking the blows. If you're comfortable with a guy cornering you that hasn't fought before that is your decision. Trainers make a difference.
There have been coaches who haven't fought who've coached champions. They, from what I've known at least, usually are not a walk on and came from another background. Dundee was a corner man and picked up a lot from the trainers he worked with.
There are coaches who weren't stand out fighters or even pros, that were coaches for champion level fighters.
There are champion fighters who coach but can't seem to reproduce the results they had in their guys.
If you're really interested someone compile statistics, and present us with a bell curve. Then we'll see the mean v the outliers.
Personally, it's about my connection with the coach. I've refused to take fights under a coach because I didn't trust he was committed. He was a stand out fighter in his day. Who cares. Psychologically I don't mesh with the guy.
There is another coach who I don't know anything about his fighting experience, but he's there everyday, he instills in me confidence and offers feedback that makes sense and doable for me. If he agrees to be my coach I'll fight under him at Regionals 2019.
There have been coaches who haven't fought who've coached champions. They, from what I've known at least, usually are not a walk on and came from another background. Dundee was a corner man and picked up a lot from the trainers he worked with.
There are coaches who weren't stand out fighters or even pros, that were coaches for champion level fighters.
There are champion fighters who coach but can't seem to reproduce the results they had in their guys.
If you're really interested someone compile statistics, and present us with a bell curve. Then we'll see the mean v the outliers.
Personally, it's about my connection with the coach. I've refused to take fights under a coach because I didn't trust he was committed. He was a stand out fighter in his day. Who cares. Psychologically I don't mesh with the guy.
There is another coach who I don't know anything about his fighting experience, but he's there everyday, he instills in me confidence and offers feedback that makes sense and doable for me. If he agrees to be my coach I'll fight under him at Regionals 2019.
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Fair enough. Good reply.
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Anatoly Lomachenko who trains his son Vasyl Lomachenko is one of the best coaches in the sport today. He had a few amateur fights but never made it to a high level but his son is one of the best Boxers in the sport. So he is a case in point that someone who had little or limited exposure to fighting themselves can still make really good coaches. As has been mentioned several times Enzo Calzaghe was a great trainer with no experience in the ring.
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Hahaha, I'm not going to drop any names. But I'll just say a few hints. This guy isn't even Thai. He's Laos posing as a Thai. And his gym is in California. He also cornered the same guy twice in the UFC. That's all I'm saying.Ah go on, who is it??
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Right I'm googling that information right now....
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He also hold pads pretty good. That's the only thing he's good at. LOL!
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I'll send you a PM and you can confirm or deny there.
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I know who your talking about but I cannot recall his name off the top of my head
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Inbox me if you don't want to expose the wrong person.
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@thugpoet
Hey dude so I would like to squash the previous beef and rude comments. You just kept going on and arguing with me about something I agree with you on as if you needed to defend yourself, which you did not. after this post I am sure you will agree with me, were on the same page dude.
This is my boxing coach. He is one of the best coaches I have ever had/met. He is also a personal friend of mine. He has boxed his entire life, his brother is a very well known and high level BJJ guy. He has a deep understanding of boxing and all martial arts in general. There are many factors as to why he is a great coach to me, being personal friends is one, as he has a perosnal interest in coaching me well vs a random dude. He has coached many MMA champions amatuer and pro as well. He has never fought a official sanctioned boxing fight. However he can fight boxing very well and is quite dangerous. So no hes not just a guy that decided to coach boxing one day. He is a boxer that never fought though. and he is a great coach. I feel very confident with him in my corner, but given he has a boxing mindset, I still need a MT guy in my corner as well. Just like Im MT first, so even if i learn whatever martial art, ill always have a MT mindset........anyways so there you have it dude. One of my personal coaches is a coach that never fought, and yes he is a great coach. I would not train with him, have him corner me, or feel confident if I didnt believe in him.
warming me up before the fight (about to throw a knee we worked on quite a bit)
and landed it a shitload of times in the fight
Hey dude so I would like to squash the previous beef and rude comments. You just kept going on and arguing with me about something I agree with you on as if you needed to defend yourself, which you did not. after this post I am sure you will agree with me, were on the same page dude.
This is my boxing coach. He is one of the best coaches I have ever had/met. He is also a personal friend of mine. He has boxed his entire life, his brother is a very well known and high level BJJ guy. He has a deep understanding of boxing and all martial arts in general. There are many factors as to why he is a great coach to me, being personal friends is one, as he has a perosnal interest in coaching me well vs a random dude. He has coached many MMA champions amatuer and pro as well. He has never fought a official sanctioned boxing fight. However he can fight boxing very well and is quite dangerous. So no hes not just a guy that decided to coach boxing one day. He is a boxer that never fought though. and he is a great coach. I feel very confident with him in my corner, but given he has a boxing mindset, I still need a MT guy in my corner as well. Just like Im MT first, so even if i learn whatever martial art, ill always have a MT mindset........anyways so there you have it dude. One of my personal coaches is a coach that never fought, and yes he is a great coach. I would not train with him, have him corner me, or feel confident if I didnt believe in him.
warming me up before the fight (about to throw a knee we worked on quite a bit)
and landed it a shitload of times in the fight
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Hello bro,
Truth be told I forgot about this thread
I have no beef with you or anyone else, there's nothing wrong with healthy debate. Two, my stance has zero to do with defending myself. It has to do with defending people who are prejudged based on what people assume what should qualify someone to do a job or not ( for example assuming one needs a degree to be a bookkeeper). Yes, there is a certain path that one can take to reach a certain level of skill to coach or whatever job you want to have however in most cases ( not all) there are multiple ways to get where you need to be. Again my self-worth is not tied to what you or anyone else said in this thread. Your wrongful assumption of that fact I find annoying.
I appreciate your attempt at squashing what differences we may have had. I really do. It takes a self-aware person to seek out common ground. Thank you.
In terms of your coach, great story I wish you and him great success.
