Eddie Hall vs. Hafthor Bjornsson

[mozfonky]

oh that's right, it was in abu dhabi. Kerr was a strong guy, Josh's background was obviously wrestling, i dont know how high a level and he was also some sort of student of Fred Sato who was a high ranking judo man and also someone who was a friend of Bruce Lee's back in the day, so I'm sure he learned judo too. Whatever the case, the trainer at Chris Charnos' gym was impressed enough by him that he asked him to come to his gym and they went from there. His career went through a lot of ups and downs as everyone knows, I'm sure, like most fighters, he got jerked around by a lot of various entities and probably the steroid use hurt him worse than it has just about any other fighter but I think he knew his stuff. I recall how his standup really improved by the last time I saw him too. but I'd have to agree, strength, experience and skill that a mark kerr would have would nullify a lot of skills. I never saw the kerr, barnett fight but I think it was just a thing where josh was pinned the whole time.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

ya, I think I might have been around Josh's gym when that fight happened, not sure. But our trainer was always saying it was more skill than size or strength, I never believed it, never, but I'm admittedly a mediocre grappler. I'd probably beat most of the general population at it but overall I'm not very good at it, or rather, i should say, i just haven't done very much. I've used a lot of grappling in my security job/fights but thats against drunks and dodo's, even if they were twice as big as me, they still weren't up to a good fight. I really should go back and work on takedowns, wrestling and submissions.

Barnett used to be one of the best pure grapplers in the world and one of the best heavyweight MMA fighters in the world simultaneously. He was HOF caliber in MMA. I always liked that he was more interested in catch wrestling than BJJ or any other submission grappling discipline due to catch wrestling's more physical dependence on strength and not just through leverage. He liked to put opponents in punishing holds and 'ride' which a lot of these grapplers today in MMA aren't very good at, at least not at heavyweight. He really understood the importance of heavy top control to crush opponents underneath him and soften them up for subsequent submissions. He was one of those grapplers that would rather not be grappling from his back/stomach which is that of a wrestler's mentality. I enjoyed watching Josh compete when he was in his prime and across various promotions.

 

[mozfonky]

Barnett used to be one of the best pure grapplers in the world and one of the best heavyweight MMA fighters in the world simultaneously. He was HOF caliber in MMA. I always liked that he was more interested in catch wrestling than BJJ or any other submission grappling discipline due to catch wrestling's more physical dependence on strength and not just through leverage. He liked to put opponents in punishing holds and 'ride' which a lot of these grapplers today in MMA aren't very good at, at least not at heavyweight. He really understood the importance of heavy top control to crush opponents underneath him and soften them up for subsequent submissions. He was one of those grapplers that would rather not be grappling from his back/stomach which is that of a wrestler's mentality. I enjoyed watching Josh compete when he was in his prime and across various promotions.

I'll always like him and be grateful to him, he was one of the only people in the mma world who really admitted he thought highly of me. I was flattered then and now. And truth is, I probably couldn't go 30 seconds with someone that much bigger, but any of us who have been around the fight world, getting any kind of validation from anyone, no matter who you are, is rare. He actually, in my opinion, thought me a better fighter than I actually was. Most of the others, you could only assume they thought you were a badass because of the roundabout things they'd say but they'd act like it was torture saying anything good about anyone but themselves. I don't care how many steroids he takes, he'll always have my gratitude for his compliments.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

@defjaam since you seem to think that I was selling Kerr short. That's the reputation he had is all due to his freakish strength. The same thing goes for a prime Matt Hughes and Pride version of Rampage (when he was slamming Arona's head into the canvas). They were all physical freaks in terms of strength.

Kerr still fights from time to time today, but is largely remembered as a tragic and cautionary figure who soared to MMA stardom on his physical gifts, only to lose it all to his personal demons.

https://www.tapology.com/fightcenter/fighters/mark-kerr-the-smashing-machine

And here's part of their summary for Barnett, who again was the better technician (as far as submission grappling goes)

Beyond his technical striking, good size, physical toughness and tenacity, Barnett is first and foremost one of the best submission fighters in the heavyweight division, having won more than 50% of his professional fights by way of submission.

PS. They have Barnett ranked #24 all-time as a grappler while Kerr is ranked #94 (despite beating Barnett twice head-to-head in pure grappling matches).

 

[mozfonky]

One thing I know for a fact about josh, he did not get enough behind the scenes work with guys his size, not his fault and the trainer seemed to think size didnt matter, I always thought it was because he was average sized.

 

[randomg1t]

the way to beat hafthor is by jabbing at him with a spear and fucking him up from a distance.

just don't walk up to him when he's down and talk shit.

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

One thing I know for a fact about josh, he did not get enough behind the scenes work with guys his size, not his fault and the trainer seemed to think size didnt matter, I always thought it was because he was average sized.

The worst I've ever seen Barnett outgrappled in MMA was against Cormier in Strikeforce 8 years ago. Cormier was just stylistically a very bad match-up for him since he was the far superior wrestler (though not the superior submission grappler). Barnett got manhandled real badly, picked up and slammed repeatedly by the smaller man with his signature high crotch lift. But, Cormier is a two-time Olympic Freestyle wrestler and was captain of the US Olympic team so there's really no shame in getting outwrestled by him. It happened to everybody else too that Cormier fought in his prime at heavyweight pretty much.

 

[mozfonky]

The worst I've ever seen Barnett outgrappled in MMA was against Cormier in Strikeforce 8 years ago. Cormier was just stylistically a very bad match-up for him since he was the far superior wrestler (though not the superior submission grappler). Barnett got manhandled real badly, picked up and slammed repeatedly by the smaller man with his signature high crotch lift. But, Cormier is a two-time Olympic Freestyle wrestler and was captain of the US Olympic team so there's really no shame in getting outwrestled by him. It happened to everybody else too that he fought at heavyweight pretty much.

He left his gym by that time, not sure if he got to work with bigger guys more or not. Last time we corresponded he didnt mention why he left but he started training in California.

 

[mozfonky]

the way to beat hafthor is by jabbing at him with a spear and fucking him up from a distance.

just don't walk up to him when he's down and talk shit.

But ya gotta talk shit all the kids do it

 

[Kovalev's "Man Bag"]

The Mountain can be toppled (though he did get ahold of McGregor several times but let him go). This footage is from like 5 years ago. It was posted to the UG at the time before I switched over here to Sherdog.

 

[aries]

In my dreams? Are you positive?
C'mon let's be realistic: Do you really think you could beat ALL average females on the planet? You don't know much about fighting.
I know a 14 y.old girl that is an amateur boxer, and she'd probably fuck you up.

LOL I train with a female brown belt and she can pretty much do what she wants with me despite being 15lbs lighter than me. So no I'm not some delusional misogynistic idiot that thinks a well-trained woman couldn't beat me. But keep trying.

 

[defjaam]

LOL I train with a female brown belt and she can pretty much do what she wants with me despite being 15lbs lighter than me. So no I'm not some delusional misogynistic idiot that thinks a well-trained woman couldn't beat me. But keep trying.

You do realize that this doesn't quite support your claim that you have Willie Pep type of footwork and that you can beat the piss out of Eddie Hall?

Btw: A female that doesn't train any martial art / combat sport could beat you up too.

 

[aries]

You do realize that this doesn't quite support your claim that you have Willie Pep type of footwork and that you can beat the piss out of Eddie Hall?

Btw: A female that doesn't train any martial art / combat sport could beat you up too.

I never said I could beat the piss out of Eddie Hall but I do think I could avoid him for large stretches of a fight. Most females could beat you too troll. Got any more great boxing opinions like when you said that no boxer ever has a game plan lol That kept me chuckling for weeks! You don't know shit about boxing and it's fucking funny! And how did you get your yellow card dickhead?

 

[defjaam]

I never said I could beat the piss out of Eddie Hall but I do think I could avoid him for large stretches of a fight. Most females could beat you too troll

You said you would ask him to step outside.... C'mooooon. We know that you would never dare to do that. You'd probably piss your pants if he even looked at you.

And I didn't say most females. But you're pretty delusional to think that every female needs combat sports experience to whoop up on you.

 

[aries]

You said you would ask him to step outside.... C'mooooon. We know that you would never dare to do that. You'd probably piss your pants if he even looked at you.

And I didn't say most females. But you're pretty delusional to think that every female needs combat sports experience to whoop up on you.

Tell me more about your boxing knowledge... I want to hear more about how no boxer ever has a game plan oh wise one lol

 

[defjaam]

And how did you get your yellow card dickhead?

I don't have it from here, I got in the heavies, which is nothing unusual... I get one 5 out of 10 times over there.

 

[TheGreatA]

Eddie Hall seems to have T-Rex arms:



Atleast he seems to have some clue about the concept of boxing though. He's using a jab and atleast trying to defend himself.

 

[TheGreatA]

If you have the skills and sufficient strength you can outgrapple significantly heavier guys, especially in Folkstyle & Freestyle wrestling, but that's usually because the bigger men you're wrestling don't know how to grapple or they're no good at it. At some point you reach a limit to just how far up you can climb and I've never seen it tested against anyone nearly as heavy as 450 pounds or remotely as strong as a guy like Hafthor (a top 3 strongest man in the world for the last 8 years). It would be a terrible idea in a street fight to attempt. Even if you manage to get a takedown it could be rather meaningless since he could just power back up or power through submission attempts you apply on him (or through his own submission attempts on you). Top control would be a serious problem with a guy that ridiculously big and strong regardless of how technical your grappling may be as well as applying many submissions.

Mark Kerr was a big guy (260 pounds or so) and strong as shit with an extensive collegiate wrestling background (D1 champ & D1 AA). His size and strength alone though allowed him to do what I just described against far more technical submission grapplers. And, just on his strength alone, he was able to beat the likes of a big man himself and technical grappler in Josh Barnett.

Here's a Freestyle wrestler that's only 158 pounds handling a bodybuilder advertised as being 340 pounds (over 300 for sure but 340 is a stretch). Notice though that he's cooperating and putting up very little resistance.

That's Finnish bodybuilder Hans Fell against a Finnish amateur wrestler Jouko Salomäki.

I think Fell legitimately weighed around or over 300 pounds, he was huge (remember that Sapp was around 330-350 too I think):

He was about 6'4 too, so not just some short guy with a lot of mass like most bodybuilders.

 

[glhfddka]

The Mountain can be toppled (though he did get ahold of McGregor several times but let him go). This footage is from like 5 years ago. It was posted to the UG at the time before I switched over here to Sherdog.

There was a moment there when Hafthor caught Conor's kick. There's an event where strongmen have to toss a big ass kettlebell 20ft into the air, and I was half expecting him to toss Conor into the rafters or into orbit

 

[weirdflex]

If Eddie does lots of legit sparring and learns how to slip, weave and duck to a reasonable standard he would probably win.
If rules are lax with holding and clinching Thor could figuratively and literally crush Eddie.

I have followed strongman for a long time so am very familiar with Eddie. He is pathologically insecure which leads to superhuman levels of competitivity. Eddie had no business getting his 500kg deadlift and even the WSM win was beyond what most would have thought possible. Sure he is somewhat gifted in athleticism but the recent decade of strongman has been about the giants like Brian Shaw and Thor. Eddie falls just under. He is a big man but not a circus freak big man. Nor is he a freak of deadlifting ability like Cailier Woolam, Belkin or Stefi Cohen. Eddie would not be a WR deadlifter as a slim man.
He achieved what he has through total and utter obsession and stubbornness. By his own accounts it pushed him over the edge in what could ever be maintained health-wise or social wise. Which is why he quit after getting just one win and the one WR he wanted.

Why is all of that relevant?

Because Eddie may well put that level of focus into the boxing. Especially as he is probably crying inside that Thor beat his record. If he does, and has a real boxing coach (not a yes man pad holder) he could dominate.

The caveat to that is that I think it is unlikely that Eddie will find a good coach and it will be even harder to find appropriate sparring partners.