Chael Sonnen on MMA wrestling

Chael Sonnen on MMA wrestling.

http://www.mmafighting.com/2013/3/9/4081332/technique-talk-chael-sonnen-mma-wrestling-interview-takedowns-ufc-news Phone Post

Interesting but do not agree completely on a few points...

I think this is the link you need.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=33BrIxAu7-M

thats a great interview

interesting take... where i disagree when you boil it down to the core techniques of wrestling and mma, takedowns are the same, the difference between the two are the set-ups

my (attempted to be condensed) opinions:

-> I don't agree the 'single doesn't exist', you see it fairly often in fact.

-> I agree american style groundwork is slightly better with its emphasis on control, however it's still completely different to MMA and I don't think any style is that relevant to MMA.

-> he says he thinks greco guys do well due to 'upright stance'... I don't get that. IMO it's the emphasis on clinchwork. That's also why older guys with a greco base do so well IMO. It's interesting that the rule limits ('clinch only' style vs 'freestyle') produce this given chael's other comments about rule limitations hurting certain styles.

-> I don't agree about russian/soviet/euro style being 'no good'. Bottom line we just don't know yet; I'm not aware of any soviet bloc olympic wrestlers to have done MMA in fact? while american ones have been doing it since 1996. However with M-1 bringing a high profile to that region, it may change in the future. Vorobieva (gold metal 72kg last olympics) already said she wanted to do MMA after the next olympics, and probably others will too as there might not be one after that... the guys he mentioned as examples of it 'not transferring' - Matyushenko had an OK career, pretty comprable to Chael's IMO, just without the high profile from trash talking; and Nedkov is 12-1 with a win over Randleman, FFS.