bjj legends vs today's bjj wizards

Plissken said:
Yes, many have competed in the ADCC, Mundials, Pan Ams, Brazilian Nationals, Rio Sate's, etc. in their late 30's to 40's and still placed highly (Sperry, Liborio, Rigan, Biteti, JJ Machado, Fabio Gurgel, and of course Royler). They really mainly lost in the ADCC to wrestlers that held them down and did little else. BJ speaks very highly of Rigan Machado, Rani and Filho speak very highly of Rickson, there were recent videos of Fabio Gurgel still schooling Marcelo while rolling, all the guys at ATT still say Liborio schools them.
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im sorry but this is a bit misleading and bya bit i mean a lot.



first off you shouldnt discredit wrestlers by saying they held them down. basically they beat them by dominant position which last time I checked is perfectly by the rules.


and we all know that the younger guys speak highly of the older legends. what this thread is about is their actual performance. you have to understand that these guys were taught/inspired by these older guys so ofcourse they are going to speak highly of them if not out of respect alone. it doesnt necessarily reflect their performance against younger, top athletes today.

and that is not true about the video of gurgel schooling marcelo. Ive seen the video of them rolling and neither is dominating the other.


marcelo is one of the best in the world, which means probably better than the one who taught him. Gurgel may be near the level of marcelo in terms of concepts, however marcelo will most likely outperform(speed, stamina, strength, reaction time) gurgel in a real bjj match. and thats why he is one of the best
 
Plissken said:
Yes, many have competed in the ADCC, Mundials, Pan Ams, Brazilian Nationals, Rio Sate's, etc. in their late 30's to 40's and still placed highly (Sperry, Liborio, Rigan, Biteti, JJ Machado, Fabio Gurgel, and of course Royler). They really mainly lost in the ADCC to wrestlers that held them down and did little else. BJ speaks very highly of Rigan Machado, Rani and Filho speak very highly of Rickson, there were recent videos of Fabio Gurgel still schooling Marcelo while rolling, all the guys at ATT still say Liborio schools them.
Click to expand...

im sorry but this is a bit misleading and bya bit i mean a lot.



first off you shouldnt discredit wrestlers by saying they held them down. basically they beat them by dominant position which last time I checked is perfectly by the rules.


and we all know that the younger guys speak highly of the older legends. what this thread is about is their actual performance. you have to understand that these guys were taught/inspired by these older guys so ofcourse they are going to speak highly of them if not out of respect alone. it doesnt necessarily reflect their performance against younger, top athletes today.

and that is not true about the video of gurgel schooling marcelo. Ive seen the video of them rolling and nobody is getting schooled. certainly not marcelo


marcelo is one of the best in the world, which means probably better than the one who taught him. Gurgel may be near the level of marcelo in terms of understanding the concepts of bjj, however marcelo will most likely outperform(speed, stamina, strength, reaction time) gurgel in a real bjj match. and thats why he is one of the best
 
Someone once said on here something to the effect of, "across the board, the new generation will be better. Except for those top 1% (or .01% or whatever) who are freaks and would excel against any generation.

I do believe Rickson is one of those guys. Rigan, too. And in a way, I almost think their age can be a benefit as long as it doesn't extend into frailty (mid-50's plus). I think that 40 years of mat time and a working knowledge of today's techniques could be pretty formiddable. It is an art as much as a science, and having perfected instincts--that right touch--that's an edge the oldies have. As long as they haven't gone stagnant or slowed their growth (like Royce perhaps).
 
Megaton Diaz still competes in the adult division and he is as old as Rickson i thought or around that age.

2568454891_2d605ac799.jpg
 
i know one guy who has rolled with rickson and heard plenty of stories. now the guy i know said rickson sticks to the basics for the most part but he can make most black belts look like white belts. marcelo always says that his trainer is better than him and ive heard people say that when andre and his trainer roll andre gets spanked so i dont know.
 
mmakid69 said:
i know one guy who has rolled with rickson and heard plenty of stories. now the guy i know said rickson sticks to the basics for the most part but he can make most black belts look like white belts. marcelo always says that his trainer is better than him and ive heard people say that when andre and his trainer roll andre gets spanked so i dont know.
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im a huge marcelo fan and what ive read is " i still rely on fabio to teach me, he knows how much i need to train" and something to the effect of "and helps me continue to improve my game".


Im not saying your wrong because i dont know every word marcelo has ever said. however - it seems a lot of guys give so much respect to their teachers by humbling themselves beneath them.


if fabio was better than marcelo, how come he wasnt rocking the BJJ world even more than marcelo is to this day? the competition was not as stiff back then as it is now so by that logic - fabio shouldve been an even bigger phenom than marcelo.


its a competitive sport like all others - the athletes, competition and technique get better with time.
 
FutureBxer said:
im a huge marcelo fan and what ive read is " i still rely on fabio to teach me, he knows how much i need to train" and something to the effect of "and helps me continue to improve my game".


Im not saying your wrong because i dont know every word marcelo has ever said. however - it seems a lot of guys give so much respect to their teachers by humbling themselves beneath them.


if fabio was better than marcelo, how come he wasnt rocking the BJJ world even more than marcelo is to this day? the competition was not as stiff back then as it is now so by that logic - fabio shouldve been an even bigger phenom than marcelo.


its a competitive sport like all others - the athletes, competition and technique get better with time.
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your absolutely right. i have no idea how good the trainers are compared to their students i just know what i have heard and seen. i dont know how to take some of the things marcelo has said but your probably right.
 
JJ Machado , who is one of the most talented grappler especially in no-gi lost to Hironaka at pro sub league, and Hironaka is a very good bjj blackbelt and a former competitive Judoka but compared to the elite is an average athletes.
 
I think most of those guys would do fine. I think the evolution of BJJ would give them a lot more trouble then their age. Guys coming up now are focusing on wrestling, and BJJ which might be difficult for some of the old school guys.

But technique is technique, and there's equally as much to be said for experience as technique.

Personally i wouldn't mess with any of them
 
We all stand on the shoulders of those who come before us. "Shoulders of giants and all that"

Think about Rolls Gracie, what we had done for BJJ if he'd survived? The open guard pushed people out to so many different avenues,...advanced spider guard, de la riva, collar/sleave, and every other variation.

I'd say that some of the best back then would have done well, but things like advances in athetic training methods etc. also would effect this outcome.
 
I think that the Legends put so much into this game they just got that triple OG Pai Mei steez..

paimei.jpg
 
i'd take Rolls over some of todays guys. although he didnt face the competition that guys face today he was one of the first guys to study everything. bjj, sambo, wrestling. and was very athletic while being great at all of the above mentioned styles of grappling
 
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