Teleported to today, he loses to basically everyone probably.
Starting training today (or 5 years ago)? He’d be a top 10 for sure, maybe champ against the current crop.
Tito isn’t world class at any specific skill, but he trained his ass off. He put in more work than basically everyone.
People should still be copying his Big Bear camps. He’d outwork every single current lhw outside of maybe Jan and Ank. If he had a chance to adapt to some of the technical developments, he’d crush most modern 205ers.
When you take it to the extreme of course there is progress and it’s not realistic to expect the initial pioneers to beat the latest settlers of an industry or sport for several reasons some out of their control. But that is where people get confused on the points some of us are making.
We are talking about after that initial exponential progress once a sport is more established and potentially closer to leveling out like some do if it was on a graph of progress.
Royce debuted in 1993
Tito Beat Bader in 2011
In 2023 Bader is still the Bellator HW Champ lol
Tito is not as far off from the 2023 LHW Divisions like a 1993 Royce was compared to the impressive 2011 Divisions of Fighters we saw
Threads like these are good for a chuckle. Reality is Tito hasn’t had a UFC belt in 20 years!
Sure, if Tito trained today he’d most likely be an even better fighter. That doesn’t change the fact he’s dumb as a bag of rocks. Tito had his day and it was a long in the past.
What set Tito apart from his opponents was his conditioning
I have to believe that Tito’s drive and determination with todays training and PED’s would be formidable
I think Tito would be top 5 minimum
Tito could not only slam him, he might crack that glass chin on Glover with his striking
Tito is coming in that cage weighing 240, jacked, with unlimited cardio, underrated BJJ, big slams and takedowns, and top 5 GnP in MMA history to this day.
Tito had real GnP. Not that limp wristed GnP. He would try to pound your face thru the mat with elbows and punches. He’s up there with fighters like Fedor, Jon Jones, Khabib, Dan Henderson, etc with the GnP. Even if they were covering up, Tito’s GnP was still destroying them… Man get real…
Like I say, Tito by 1 round slam and a few punches or elbows before Big John pulls him off Glover’s unconscious body…
That frank shamrock loss changed him for the better. I respect a fighter who can sure up a weakness. I really respect a fighter who can make his weakness one of his strengths. That’s dedication.
Tito’s biggest advantage during his heyday was that he was bigger and stronger than everyone else. He would bully all of his opponents with his wrestling and pound them out.
In todays MMA he would be considered on the smaller side would likely be a middle of the road fighter. No version of Ortiz would have ever posed any trouble to Bones, Glover wouod probably school him in everything.
Tito was great for his time but in reality was a one dimensional fighter who had to get the fight to the ground for a chance to win
