Been a long time since I’ve watched shooto organization fights.
I honestly don’t remember punches to a downed opponent being illegal.
Edit: just watched caol uno v. Rumina sato on Jimmy Smiths classic fight club series on YouTube.
There were strikes to the downed opponents head in that shooto match.
Not taking anything away from Coleman, but Igor had 2 tough matches (Goodridge and Sakuraba) on his way to the finals, whereas Coleman had shoji and then basically a bye in rd 2 when Fujita’s corner threw in the towel 2 seconds in.
Good one. Yoel arguably beat Whittaker (even though it wouldn’t have made him champ.) Yoel also would not have been a heavy underdog against Daniel Cormier, which is crazy.
Romero is the only answer. Should be champ right now imo.
Romero has DEFINITELY not achieved even close to what Igor and Sakuraba did.
If you could throw Rizzo into that sentence, we can be best friends…
I’m a Rizzo fan; he was definitely one of those “Oh, he’s going to be a champ in a minute or two” and then he caught the yips and couldn’t pull the trigger. His KO of Barnett is one of my favorites. He’s got 5 wins over UFC HW champs.
I concur completely which made Coleman’s Tornament victory even less likely, not saying he had the hardest path… That 250k at the time, that fucking INSANE belt, the trophy, pretty sure he got to keep at least 2 Ring Girls, There was some other nice perks and prizes too. But that lowest of the low to the highest of the high speach was it for me especually since I was still actively fighting. Like I said earlier, my eyes were wet watching it.
Gegard or Rumble
UFC thought so too. Thats why they gave him that huge contract (for the time). Rizzo is an O.G. Legend!
I was just looking up whatever happened to Lyle Beerbohm.
Where exactly would you draw the line on what is or isn’t MMA? Pancrase always allowed palm-strikes to the head of a downed opponent (though some wouldn’t do this due to gentleman’s agreements). Shooto didn’t always allow punches to a grounded opponent’s face. From approximately 1988 to 1994 you could kick, punch, knee, etc., your opponent’s body while he was on the ground, but not attack his face. It was still very much MMA, and the skill level was light-years ahead of the rest of world in terms of a fully integrated system of combat that took into consideration every range of a fight.
Maybe anything that isn’t full-on old school Vale Tudo/NHB shouldn’t be considered MMA. Why would we consider something to be mixed martial arts if headbutts, soccer kicks, 6-9 elbows, etc. aren’t legal? Although strangely enough a lot of the old-school Brazilian promotions had more rules than you might think. I don’t think that the IVC allowed groin strikes. Circuito de Lutas didn’t allow them, or fish-hooking, or strikes to the back of the head. A lot of the old-school vale tudo from 50+ years ago had rules similar to the original Pancrase rules.
I’m not saying any of this to be rude, but rather make a case that anything that tries to revolve around fighting in all of its ranges (I.E., punching, kicking, throws/takedowns, submissions) should be considered MMA, despite fluctuations in rulesets.
Here is some Shooto from 1990. Before strikes to the head of a grounded opponent are legal. Outside of the vintage video quality, you would be forgiven if you thought you were watching some late 90s/early 00’s MMA. Everyone here knew how to fight in all of the fighting ranges, even though their philosophy on the ground was to always go gonzo looking for a submission. They clearly didn’t have the BJJ submission over position mentality, but you wouldn’t think this wasn’t real MMA.
Igor’s second fight with Kerr was after the tournament, but I think that makes your case even stronger.
I think when Igor got dq’d the first time he was probably the best in the world. Coleman certainly had a claim for that time period though
Unrelated, but looking at Igor’s record for that year to confirm the timeline of the Kerr fights and holy shit did he have a 2000. Most ammy’s I know know, my bitch ass self included, won’t do more than 3 or 4 a year. Dude had 8 fights.
A sincere thank you for that clarification and letting me know I wasn’t going crazy
This is awesome. These guys were ahead of their time. Thanks for sharing
Although some effort may be required, if any of you haven’t done so already, there is tons of Shooto history contained in this thread, and lots more will be added in the days to come.
His elbows though!
That’s the difference between MMA and NHB. IMO, they’re different sports with a pile of similarities but very subtle and nuanced differences.
Kelvin Gastelum
