Rickson Gracie’s memoir ‘Breathe’ spills a lot of tea

Truth.

Don and Ken left literally everything in the ring that night. They were never the same after that.

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I think Ken was pretty new still in 93. I’m not sure what year he started training with Funaki and Suzuki, maybe 90? So he was pretty green in 93.

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Suzuki attacks the back a fair amount. He was one of Ken’s coaches/ training partners.

He uses knee on face pretty well to force people to turtle to attack the back.

But the back definitely wasn’t as well developed in catch as BJJ.

Remember when Frank Shamrock broke Goes’ leg?

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That fight is a classic

Goes was a tough motherfucker. I thought he beat Henderson and in this fight he shows his toughness. That crazy fucker fought Tank Abbott in the bleachers at a UFC.

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Sakaraba didnt wantr to break the arm Royler came nowhere near escaping .His arm would have broke this isnt a street fight

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I’ve changed my mind on that finish a few times. But presently as I see it, Royler’s arm was not in danger at the time of the stoppage. His shoulder is a mile off the mat, and saku can’t put it any deeper without changing position.

your entitled to your opinion. Mine is Sakaraba had huge size advantage plenty of time and Royler could not escapeand was in plenty of danger with full blown sub that he couldnt move from… he would have broken his arm like he did to Renzo but worse

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It definitely could have gone south eventually, but Saku wasn’t really applying breaking mechanics at the time of the stoppage.

Kimuras are hard to finish on good people, especially flexible good people.

But Sakuraba was absolutely in control, had been brutalizing Royler the entire fight, and might very well have broken it in time. I’m just saying the choice to stop it at that specific moment was not great.

I agree … although I’d say that is Royler’s problem and his decision whether or not to tap or have it broken.
The ref shouldn’t have stopped it.

Royce was green too. He was known as a Jujutsu guy and he had a lot of JJ matches in Brazil. UFC 1 was Royce’s first experience in MMA. He beat three bigger men in a single evening and won a measly 50K for the effort.

Did Royce have a lot of BJJ pro matches in Brazil?

I was always under the impression Royce did not have a ton of BJJ competition experience and he was doing Gracie challenge type stuff, so he did have some MMA type experience, though not as a pro. Actually I think Wallid or someone said Royce never won Nationals or any big tournament in Brazil.

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IIRC, the Gracies demanded specifically that the ref couldn’t stop the fight be in the rules, but he did anyway

There was plenty of time left .Royler had no escape or he would have done so.Sak was being nice not breaking it.Hes twice his size and strength and has good technique.Disagree with Kimuras being difficult to finish .I trained at Serras 7 years It was one of the most comment subs

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not s street fight

They always wanted special rules.

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Even way back when after kimura choked out Helio the Gracie’s demanded the fight be restarted since choke outs weren’t technically in the rules as a way of winning so they restarted and kimura went and easily broke helio’s arm lol.

They gloss over a lot of those details in their telling, of course. A simple gi choke is just as warranted in being referred to as a kimura.

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