Account of The Rickson Gracie Vs. Yoji Anjo Fight

[mattemate]

Yep… I travelled 27 years ago to the states as an exchange student to learn English… that’s where my English comes from… fuck I’m old…

it also depends on the lenguage.. English is a much easier language to learn that guarani…guaraní is not easy.

Haha I meant Guarani. But see? I've been talking shit on sherdog with you for YEARS and your written English at least is native more or less. My point is you didn't get that experience in Guarani. Probably nobody has that same experience with Guarani. I've been to tons of vietnamese restaurants but don't speak vietnamese lol

 

[BJJ_Rage]

Haha I meant Guarani. But see? I've been talking shit on sherdog with you for YEARS and your written English at least is native more or less. My point is you didn't get that experience in Guarani. Probably nobody has that same experience with Guarani. I've been to tons of vietnamese restaurants but don't speak vietnamese lol

Yeah but the difference is we have guarani for 6 years at school, and is spoken all the time.. one of the things I regret the most is not speaking guarani, but it’s Just not that easy… although now that I think, If I’m thrown in a town that only speaks guarani, I guess I would end up speaking it quite well by the end of the year, may be wouldn’t be as easy as learning english, but that would have to do more with how easy is to transition from Spanish to English than anything else

 

[Coconutwater]

well prime Kerr couldn’t do much to gurgel either, and gurgel wasn’t the most experienced fighter at the time, a fresh no experienced Coleman wouldn’t be able to beat rickson, I have no doubt that 99 Coleman would’ve fucked up rickson

Mark Kerr wasn't in his prime against Fabio, he only had 2 fights before facing the Alliance General!

As for Coleman, I can see Rickson tapping Coleman on bottom with an armbar or knee bar/ankle lock, in 1994.

But get Mark Kerr 1998, or Mark Coleman 2000, and Rickson gets beaten IMO. Rickson was at his peak in 1994-1995 at the latest.

 

[BJJ_Rage]

Mark Kerr wasn't in his prime against Kerr, he only had 2 fights before facing the Alliance General!

As for Coleman, I can see Rickson tapping Coleman on bottom with an armbar or knee bar/ankle lock, in 1994.

But get Mark Kerr 1998, or Mark Coleman 2000, and Rickson gets beaten IMO. Rickson was at his peak in 1994-1995 at the latest.

i agree…

 

[listrahtes]

Rickson was also known among wrestlers in SoCal at the time - apparently he had had some friendly challenge matches with at least one college wrestling coach. Consensus was you didn't want to go to the mat with him.

Yeah but why. The sparring challenges of Rickson vs. wrestlers were jokes. The Vale Tudo Rickson demanded no slams, no punches. basically nothing that could damage him. Its well known that these were his conditions. . Mark Schultz talked in detail about it. Still Rickson couldnt do shit to them as long as they had cardio. He waited that out and then a sub. Why do you think Schultz wasnt invited into UFC despite him wanting to.

 

[MRT]

Wrong. It's actually my specialty. Teenagers learn new languages the fastest. The whole notion that kids learn a language faster than adults is based on shoddy research that got extrapolated into the broader psychological concept of "critical period." Due to metalingusitic awareness, given the same amount of exposure to a second language, an adult will learn much faster than a child. AMA. This was the topic of my master's report (Factors affecting native like pronunciation in a second language).

Interesting...I was under the impression that synaptic pruning was relevant here, which occurs at a much earlier age than in the teens. The idea being that sound processing and production thatis not contained within a native or learned language by that point would 'fall away' to some extent...which would partially explain the idea that children learning a language from birth or a very young age would (on average) have a significant advantage in achieving near-native proficiency (as opposed to fluency w/o a near-native accent, which is common among adults)?

 

[ChickenBrother]

Yeah but why. The sparring challenges of Rickson vs. wrestlers were jokes. The Vale Tudo Rickson demanded no slams, no punches. basically nothing that could damage him. Its well known that these were his conditions. . Mark Schultz talked in detail about it. Still Rickson couldnt do shit to them as long as they had cardio. He waited that out and then a sub. Why do you think Schultz wasnt invited into UFC despite him wanting to.

Not sure how this is inconsistent with my post? The head wrestling coach of El Camino college in SoCal where I took the LEO course in 1991 had grappled with Rickson in practice and apparently had taken him down multiple times but been submitted each time. He said if he ever had to fight him for real he'd try to slam him repeatedly then disengage and stand back up. He also talked of a Bulgarian national team HW who had been passing through and everyone thought would be too big and strong and Rickson "wouldn't even be able to get his legs around him to play guard." Apparently Rickson subbed him too. It's not like Rickson sequestered himself in a gym and only trained with BJJ guys - as I understand it he did a fair amount of cross-training and of course competed and lost to Ron Tripp at the 1993 U.S. Sambo Championships.

Of course most wrestlers of the time weren't used to having to pass guard nor actively attacking or defending subs. As per my other posts, I'm not even saying Rickson was the best NHB/MMA fighter of his time. His reputation then and now is based on limited fights and is largely anecdotal but it was definitely out there by 1991 and even more so in 1994 after UFC 1. Certainly a lot of folks didn't buy into it, but anyone seriously angling to fight Rickson who had approached the Gracies for a fight would at least have known of his reputation.

 

[mattemate]

Interesting...I was under the impression that synaptic pruning was relevant here, which occurs at a much earlier age than in the teens. The idea being that sound processing and production thatis not contained within a native or learned language by that point would 'fall away' to some extent...which would partially explain the idea that children learning a language from birth or a very young age would (on average) have a significant advantage in achieving near-native proficiency (as opposed to fluency w/o a near-native accent, which is common among adults)?

There are many factors. Neuroplasticity varies with age, person to person, and on environmental factors. Certainly it plays a role.

The thing is, the old psychological notion of a critical period is bogus. It's based on a couple of feral child case studies and was extrapolated to many other different ideas in psychology. It was later changed to the notion of a sensitive period but even that doesn't hold water.

Another good example is perfect pitch. It was thought that this is a genetically based phenomenon. But it was noticed that people that speak a tonal language are way more likely (5-10 times) to have perfect pitch. Also, the more tones, the more likely. Hmong and Thai have more tones than mandarin, and more members with perfect pitch. Ever notice how tone deafness is a thing? Some native speakers of tone languages are also toned off and they have a very difficult time-- it's tantamount to having a language processing disorder.

Anyway recent research is also showing that the idea of perfect pitch being something that is inherent is just not true-- it can be practiced and learned.

Not EVERYONE, for sure, but it's a learnable skill for the most part