This is list of fighters whom I don't know anything about, or don't fully understand the significance of.
Frank Shamrock
Oleg Taktarov
Mark Kerr
Marco Ruas
Joachim Hansen
Maurice Smith
Pedro Rizzo
RINGS, the organization
My hope is someone takes a cue from forum member Whistleblower, and educates the shit out of me. Fights to watch, context, etc. is all helpful. Thanks.
Don't be stupid.
Wikipedia ftw
Sherdog is that way-------------------->
jesus christ
frank shamrock...........really?
Explanation... You're new...
All great fighters, but I have no clue to how long you've followed the sport....
As far as understanding the significane of each... GOOGLE, BING, SHERDOG, and a million others are youre friend... Use them... Dont be lazy, the internet s nice, but you arent a parapalegic baby.. You dont even need to buy or trade fro a tape (Lost of people here since 2000 did that, and imagine, they even paid to UPS/Fed Ex to deliver a VHS tape.... (Fucking losers/MMAfans) Yeah I did it too...
Last piece of advice... You obviously have a copmuter, be a lil creative and do some homework... it's not like your even paying to learn about therse guys... Most of these guys can be found on the internet (All worth following)
Do that and take the UG hazing with a grain of salt.... Hope that helps...
Get your hands on some RINGS tapes, sit down and enjoy. The King of Kings tournament Hendo won is one of my favorite events of all time...ALL TIME.
Honestly as a long time MMA fan I find the resources of the interwebs very lacking in explaining the impact and greatness certain fighters attained during their careers. Wiki doesn't have the depth I would like for 99% of fighters and neither do many other sites.
If it wasn't late I would type more but my wife is already pissed at me so I'll keep this short.
Frank - A large part if not all of his "greatness" came in the UFC. His time in Pancrase was obviously a learning experience for him and when he made his UFC debut he was an underdog to olympic gold medalist Kevin Jackson. A first minute upset set Frank's train rolling. Igor Zinoviev had huge followings after beating Mario Sperry and was may have been a favorite entering that fight until Frank ended his career with a brutal slam. The biggest win of his career, imho, was of course against Tito when he simply outlasted him and made him tap to strikes. "What a gutsy preformance by the champ" was the call at the end of that fight.
Ruas - Really introduced the world to thundering leg kicks. Ruas vs Varlens (UFC 7) is a good fight to watch someone get chopped down with kicks. Seemed to lack heart though and lost some fights he should have won. Pedro Rizzo was his student and picked up where Ruas left off.
Taktarov - one of my favorites but was really undersized and couldn't handle the wrestling of guys liek Kenny and Severn. Winning UFC 6 against Tank was his biggest accomplishment.
I'll come back to this tommorrow if I find time and no one else has responded.
I think in those early days it was like watching the story of MMA unfold..
the story began with UFC and this little dude Royce tapping out these bigger guys..
all these guys are part of that history of MMA.. Ruas showed the importance of muay thai and leg kicks.. Oleg and his toughness.. Mo and his kickboxing.. Mark Kerr a dominating monster of a wrestler..
Frank Shamrock was the 1st dominating champion with his first 2 fights in the ufc lasting 16 seconds and 22 seconds.. with amazing finishes.. armbar and body slam.
Most fights at this time varied from a few minutes to almost and hour or more (in Pride)... Frank was an underdog in both fights and smashed these guys faster than you can pound a beer.
the thing too is that it was months.. 5-6 months at a time in between fights.. and in my case.. I didnt have cable so I would have to watch the fights at a bar.. or wait till it came out on videotape
you get ur fix.. then have to wait 6 months till you could watch the next fight.
Thanks, guys. Definitely helpful.
A lot of what I'm missing is context. For example, I've seen Rizzo's fights before, but I've never really understood where he stands in the history of MMA.
Thanks for the help.
MDubz - Mark Kerr was pretty much the biggest badass in MMA but he was all jacked up on roids
LOL. Amongst other things.
lol @ brahmabull81 telling Dukelsh to go to the tuf website, Dukelsh has been a forum member longer than brahmabull81
UfcSpyGUY - Frank Shamrock _ the adopted brother of Ken Shamrock, is a mixed martialartist. He first fought in pancrase where he won a fight by decision over Bas rutten. In 1997 he joined the ufc he first fought kevin jackson, Frank won by armbar in the 1st rd. He was then crowned as the ufc middleweight champion, he beat Tito ortiz by submission at ufc 22 in 1999 that was his last fight in the ufc. He has since fought in several other org's.VTFU
Oleg Taktarov_Is from russia he trained in Judo and sambo he is known for being a tough sob and he was notorious for taking alot of damage and still winning fights he fougth in ufc 5 return of the beast ( dan the beast severn) oleg won his first fight however later in the evening he lost to The beast. He last fought for the ufc at the ultimate ultimate in 1995, he has since went on to have good parts in a few movies, he is a decent actor. he has continued to fight for different promotions and last fought mark kerr in 2008 he beat kerr by kneebar.
Mark The Specimen Kerr_ was a division 1 wrestling champion for syracuse in 1992. in 1997 he fjoined the ufc he fought in ufc 14 and 15 he won all 4 of his ufc fights, Kerr was known for his brutal GnP style. And the brutal ko over ranger greg stott by knee to the face at ufc 15. Kerr left the ufc and went to the pride orginization he has since fought for several other promotions , the re is a documentary about Kerr called The Smashing Machine. He has battled with addictions. Kerr has 2 wins and 5 losses since 2007 he last competed in M-1 IN 09.
Marco Ruas_ Nick named The King Of The Streets. he is known for his style of ruas vale tudo a combination of Bjj and Kickboxing. He competed in Ufc 7 , and ufc ultimate ultimate. his last ufc fight was at ufc 21 where he lost by tko to maurice smith. He has competed in a few othe mma promotions, he is also a well know trainer in his native Brazil he has trained Renato sobral , pedro rizzo and several other mma fighters.
Joachim Hansen_AKA (HellBoy) is from norway he started fighting for a finnish fight promotion known as finnfight. he has fought for K-1 , Pride and Dream. he holds victory's over Rumina sato, Yves Edwars, Caol Uno , Shinya Aoki. he last competed at Dream 14 in may of 2010.
Maurice Smith _ In 1983 AT 22 YEARS OF AGE MO BECAME THE AKA kICKBOXING HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION, HE ALSO WON THE wkc light heavyweight champion. he has won titles in muay thai and several other kickboxing championchips. he owas undefeated in the kickboxing circut for several years.
Smith Beat Mark Coleman at UFC 14 to become the ufc heavyweight champion. at UFC japan he lost the title to randy couture. Smith has not competed since 08 he continues to train and is thinking of fighting again, he currently trains various fighters.
Pedro Rizzo _ once called the rock hails from Brazil he trained under Marco Ruas and was said to be Ruas's best student. He first appeared in the UFC at Ultmate Brazil, where he KO'd Tank Abbott, His last UFC appearence was at UFC 45 he holds wins over several top names in the sport such as Josh Barnett, Mark Coleman, Ricco Rodrigues, and Andrei Arlovski.
Rings Organization_ was a japanese pro wrestling org, that decided they wanted to promote mma fights, they have been suspected to have some worked fights do not know anything else about the promotion.
Want any more info feel free to ask.
I like the "context" part of the question of the OP. He doesnt want to necessarily know FACTS about these fighters, but what their impact on the sport it. I get the sense that he's interested in how it felt to watch these fighters at the time. I have to respect that.
Take note that most of the assholes on this thread are also seemingly relatively new, and the nice guys are not. It takes a positive attitude to have longevity in this sport :)
I'll check back in later but:
RE: Frank Shamrock
Some things that haven't been said (that i can see) are that Frank came into the game hot on the heels of Ken, who had been very successful at that time.
Ken was a big american (looked the part for the typical fan at the time) who knew some things about submissions (which everyone thought made the fighter at the time because of Royce) and hit hard on the feet, having more success against Dan Severn than Royce did (in one of their fights) and crushing tough and very dangerous newcomer Brian Johnston. People wanted more from Ken, and with another Shamrock coming into MMA they got exactly what they wanted.
The buzz about Frank at the time was that he had only trained for a year or two (if memory serves), and he was smaller than Ken, so to see him come in and demolish the two aforementioned fighters in mere seconds, one with the first slam KO in MMA (that i know about) was absolutely astonishing. He walked all over everyone the UFC put in from of him, including what they billed at the time as the vengeance to his "only loss in no holds barred fighting." (Noone called it MMA at the time.) Although he never lost in the UFC, they brought in John Lober (who i knew from I think the IFC) as basically the only man that anyone thought stood a chance due to the previous loss and Frank had his way with Lober as well.
Everyone called Ken the "most dangerous man in the world" at the time, and with Frank's success they added a category: "Most dangerous man under 200 lbs." And everyone believed it. If memory serves (this could have been someone else... someone can confirm) he carried his belts out with him and joked that the UFC would go bankrupt if they had to keep making new belts for him. I believe he "retired" from MMA with five belts and left everyone wanting more.
Of course he ultimately came back for a few more fights, but his legacy at the time was remarkable.
-doug-
Great stuff. Thanks, guys.
DukeIsh -
Frank Shamrock - Had unbelievable cardio. Ran over a lot of guys back in the day. His slam on Igor Z. was just flat out brutal and ended Igors career. Finished guys like Enson, Tito, Horn. IIRC his first fight was a win vs Bas in rings or pancrase. Not bad.
Oleg Taktarov - typical russian fighter; sambo based and tough as fucking hell. His resume is basically a whos who of MMA.
Mark Kerr - watch the smashing machine. Tons of great behind the scenes footage an a pretty good short documentary on Renzo in there as well.
Marco Ruas - Go watch UFC 7: Buffalo. First time I saw a guy systematically cut down an opponant (Varelens). Probably should be recognized as the first all around MMA fighter. He had standup, he had JJ. Unfortunately by the time he came to the UFC I think he was already about 34-35 so we probably never really even saw his prime.
Joachim Hansen - Good fighter; not great. Still active so watch some Dream/K-1 vids online.
Maurice Smith - Great standup. Ground game cost him lots of fights in pancrase/rings.
Pedro Rizzo - scary good in his day. Had tons of talent but never seemed to really put it together. Absolutely destroyed Randys leg in their first fight . Probably was the first equivilent to the hyped up prospect that was good but nowhere near as great as they SHOULD have been!
RINGS, the organization - lots of guys got there starts or paid their dues in Rings
ttt