Charles, Demian, Sousa or Werdum: Which of them applied grappling in MMA better?

[randomg1t]

Not maia that's for damn sure, Worst fighter of that bunch, Most one dimensional and if im being honest, Sometimes had pathetic performances.

one of the worst fighters to watch ever imo. Love watching him get KO'd

tell me you're clueless without telling me you're clueless.

 

[RockyLockridge]

tell me you're clueless without telling me you're clueless.

Whatever you say big dawg lmao

 

[Left Hook Lacy]

All of them were great.

 

[Sycho Sid]

Charles seems out of place on this list

 

[DanDragon Machi]

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Fight was almost all grappling, maia still lost.

Ok, but why are you treating Shields as he was trash? His grappling is amazing

 

[plataoplombo]

Maia for sure. Was so good at that nobody wanted to go to the ground with him.

 

[RockyLockridge]

Ok, but why are you treating Shields as he was trash? His grappling is amazing

I'm not, Im just saying of the people you listed, all of them are the best bjj practitioners in mma in their respective weight class at the time they were on top. Maia does not fit that description.

 

[JBJ was here]

Easily Maia. The other guys had a plan B and won lots of fights without grappling, Maia had nothing to fall back on.

His ass. He had his ass to fall back on.

 

[TheBulge]

Close between Jacare and Werdum.

Jacare had one problem. Too much of a warrior, he was sometimes outmatched striking and it lead to a bad loss.

Werdum knew when he was outmatched standing so he would either go for takedowns. Or lure the fight to the ground or just flop.

 

[Patof]

Charles has the most subs and perhaps the flashiest grappling, but quite a few of his finishes were set up by devastating striking, and he's also been subbed himself a few times.

Maia on the other hand never really had explosive or technical striking, he pretty much had all the success that he did entirely do to his top tier BJJ.

 

[fortheo]

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Fight was almost all grappling, maia still lost.

It was a controversial split decision and there was some shitty striking mixed in where shields landed more in most rounds and that could have swayed judges in such a close decision. In the grappling, Maia got more takedowns and the most dangerous positions of the fight. pretty much all shields did in the grappling was get a reversal and sit in guard while taking zero risks for more control time -- that's it.

Anyone who came out with the idea that one conclusively out-grappled the other is being disingenuous. But you already said you love watching Maia get knocked out, so I kind of see what is going on here lol.

 

[Evenflow80]

Aside from Royce Gracie, Maia is by far the most pure BJJ grappler we've ever seen in MMA. No one adjusted jiu jitsu for MMA like he did. His striking was non existent and not once was he ever even remotely in trouble on the ground. Opponents actively avoided going to the ground with him.

Might seem boring to the casual but as someone who's done BJJ for almost 10 years now and was my main inspiration for getting in BJJ (alongside Marcelo Garcia) , he was a pleasure to watch.

 

[Evenflow80]

I'm not, Im just saying of the people you listed, all of them are the best bjj practitioners in mma in their respective weight class at the time they were on top. Maia does not fit that description.

Yet Maia is the only one ofnthem where every single opponent he faced aside from Jake Shields actively avoided going to the ground with him.

 

[Killhippies]

I still don't think we have seen a true BJJ + overall grappling phenom yet, like someone who can match a American Olympian or Dagastani takedown game with the skill of excellent passing and submissions.

Oliveira is close, but doesn't have the wrestling pedigree. Maia was an absolute joy to watch, but he only got his wrestling to a level that was serviceable which helped him immensely once he put it together. Maia is probably the best application of meat and potatoes BJJ, never rushed or did anything overly flashy. Just extremely excellent technique, position over submission.

 

[Flower2dPeople]

Maia had nothing to fall back on.

Outside of the single and half guard sweep, all he did was fall back.

 

[JPOMMA]

Aside from Royce Gracie, Maia is by far the most pure BJJ grappler we've ever seen in MMA. No one adjusted jiu jitsu for MMA like he did. His striking was non existent and not once was he ever even remotely in trouble on the ground. Opponents actively avoided going to the ground with him.

Might seem boring to the casual but as someone who's done BJJ for almost 10 years now and was my main inspiration for getting in BJJ (alongside Marcelo Garcia) , he was a pleasure to watch.

I think in UFC yes, but not MMA. That would be Rickson. All BJJ, top control if possible, if not he would use an aggressive guard (with heel strikes, etc.). Literally no striking except maybe a jab to gauge the distance and set things up.

 

[muaythaibeast]

lol

Maia is one of my all time favourite fighters, but Shields was elite with literally no striking game at all. He lost to the bully on bully beatdown in a striking only match, but beat Hendo, Daley, Condit, Okami, Maia, Lawler, Thomson and Akiyama.
In terms of who was the more accomplished, you'd probably have to give it to Shields.

 

[muaythaibeast]

I still don't think we have seen a true BJJ + overall grappling phenom yet, like someone who can match a American Olympian or Dagastani takedown game with the skill of excellent passing and submissions.

Oliveira is close, but doesn't have the wrestling pedigree. Maia was an absolute joy to watch, but he only got his wrestling to a level that was serviceable which helped him immensely once he put it together. Maia is probably the best application of meat and potatoes BJJ, never rushed or did anything overly flashy. Just extremely excellent technique, position over submission.

Khabib and Fedor meet that surely? Both have an elite level takedown game, Fedor had great subs from all positions, and Khabib was very good at passing guard.

 

[iwannabeadored]

Khabib and Fedor meet that surely? Both have an elite level takedown game, Fedor had great subs from all positions, and Khabib was very good at passing guard.

Fedor didn’t have elite takedowns, he had good trips. No singles or doubles. Khabib

 

[JPOMMA]

What’s kinda sad is that the original jujutsu (not jiu jitsu, let alone the Brazilian kind) had a lot of takedowns (including some similar to wrestling) and ways to deal with strikes.

Then Kano stripped it down to make it a school curriculum in Japan and even that got stripped down further to become an Olympic sport. Now it’s “Judo” and it’s two guys tugging at each other (what happened to the fireman carry for ex.?).

At the other end of the spectrum (and the world aka Brazil), it became BJJ and was eventually turned into a “game” that starts from the ground and became unrecognizable to fighting (spider guard anyone?).

So guys adapting BJJ to MMA is actually going back in time to the original thing. It had all the takedown tools needed to begin with. In a gym where I trained in Japan we had a huge poster with dozens of old takedowns.

It’s hard to admit but if we ignore all the media BS, Ronda is the closest thing we’ve had to the original JJ since Rickson. Jab to gauge distance > grab > throw > armbar finish…all in one motion, as it’s meant to be.

Combat sambo is a close cousin but has much more striking.

I know modern BJJ purists love Maia but he was missing half the original JJ curriculum.

Thank you for reading my essay looool