How good was Tito Ortiz?

99 said:
He earned a hard-fought decision win over a roided-out LHW version of Vitor. One of my all-time favorite fights, but forgotten by most people today. The back-and-forth, with Vitor landing huge shots on the feet and almost KOing Tito, and then Tito coming back with a takedown and brutal GnP, was incredible.
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Vitor gassed.
 
theincognito said:
He was a rookie when he lost to Shamrock and Mezger. Still dominated Frank anyway before gassing out and avenged the loss to Mezger.

As for the "undersized opponents" argument, he manhandled Olympic level wrestler Vladimir Matyushenko who mostly fought at HW.

Sinosic (I think) and Cote were late replacements.

Couture and Liddell were great fighters and bad matchups for him. No shame in those losses.

He was really good when it comes down to it. He still would be really good if he came along today. Probably a lot better with the upgraded training methods.
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<YeahOKJen>
 
mjfan23 said:
He was competitive against the next generation too in fights against Forrest and Rashad. Won’t even mention Bader lol
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Yeah gotta give props on that. Had good quality early wins (Mezger, Vitor, Wanderlia, Tanner) and then was able to stay competitive a handful of times late in his career
 
He was never that good when exposed but he was massive for the division and fighting a bunch of guys who were susceptible to being taken down by the bigger, stronger wrestler. Tito also had good cardio. Surprisingly enough, all things considered, Tito’s most impressive win was Bader, his striking always sucked hard and the fact that he put bader down then choked him out still doesn’t feel like reality.
 
LilNicky95 said:
Taking an objective look at his career, he beat up mostly undersized guys, MWs (even lost to a few, Frank Shamrock) and a WAY over the hill Ken Shamrock X 3.

Ortiz’s primary rivals Chuck and Randy destroyed Ortiz when they matched up in their Primes.

I know their will inevitably be the simpletons that will jump on this thread and call Ortiz a “legend” and that he carried the UFC in the early days.

But if I recall correctly, Ortiz avoided fighting Liddell for like 3-4 years and fought guys like Elvis Sinosic and Patrick Cote??

I would say Ortiz ranks behind guys like Serraldo Babalu and definitely Machida in the all time UFC LHW greats.

What say you?
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Got good? Get good, kid. :)
 
He is a popular target of insults around this place, most of those people never even really saw him during his prime, or realize the impact that he once had on the sport. Tito was a very good fighter in his day, obviously not the best but he was in that top-tier. Put on some very exciting fights and had some huge promotions. He was in a lot of ways the first legitimate superstar in the sport in a day in which the sport was not drawing any main stream attention. Rematch with Chuck did over 1 million buys and this was in 2007. Mixed martial arts was not ever drawing that kind of buy rate in 2007. That was Tito’s star power. He also was the first guy to really stand up and demand to be paid what he was worth. That’s why Dana White has shit all over him attempting to ruin his reputation at every turn..
 
He lost to a guy in weight class below as about the only time he fought decent competition outside of chuck and randy (of which he lost to as well).

It's funny how some noobs here would dare praise Tito as being great in his day and then call BJ Penn overrated in a different thread. BJ beat the champ in the weight class above him, Tito lost to the guy in the weight class below him to get a perspective of how much better BJ was than Tito.
 
Dbreiden83080 said:
He is a popular target of insults around this place, most of those people never even really saw him during his prime, or realize the impact that he once had on the sport. Tito was a very good fighter in his day, obviously not the best but he was in that top-tier. Put on some very exciting fights and had some huge promotions. He was in a lot of ways the first legitimate superstar in the sport in a day in which the sport was not drawing any main stream attention. Rematch with Chuck did over 1 million buys and this was in 2007. Mixed martial arts was not ever drawing that kind of buy rate in 2007. That was Tito’s star power. He also was the first guy to really stand up and demand to be paid what he was worth. That’s why Dana White has shit all over him attempting to ruin his reputation at every turn..
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He was an absolutely massive draw for the time period, him fighting Ken Shamrock was the very first time I could watch a fight live on PPV in my country rather than getting it later on VHS and I remember him being the cover boy for just about all those garbage ps2 UFC games. But his record is trash, being a big draw and being one the best are 2 completely different things. Cain Velasquez has a god tier resume in comparison to Tito and Cain's record is one of the most disappointing things to come out of a guy with that much potential.
 
He trained like 9 days a week.

Who ELSE could ever did that?

WHO?

<31><30>
 
Juzie said:
He was an absolutely massive draw for the time period, him fighting Ken Shamrock was the very first time I could watch a fight live on PPV in my country rather than getting it later on VHS and I remember him being the cover boy for just about all those garbage ps2 UFC games. But his record is trash, being a big draw and being one the best are 2 completely different things. Cain Velasquez has a god tier resume in comparison to Tito and Cain's record is one of the most disappointing things to come out of a guy with that much potential.
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His record is good for his era.. Not one of the best ever, but he was one of the most important MMA fighters of all time.
 
Prime Tito Ortiz takes down bozos like Jan and Jiri and pounds them out with elbows.
 
theincognito said:
Miss me with your weird biases.

Another thing: beat Wanderlei right as his dominant run was getting underway, leaving no doubt as to who the real champ was at the time.
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titowah3lk.jpg
 
Tito is very underrated here imo because he is dumb and Rogan does not like him.
 
Winbot said:
Tito may not have been an amazing fighter all round but the guy found a strategy that consistently won fights. A big part of success at the higher end of the sport is understanding your strengths and weaknesses and finding a way to make as many fights as possible your type of fight. For that Tito deserves a lot of credit. Dude had a T-Rex build and made it work in a sport where range is a huge factor in who wins a fight.
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What fights did he consistently win ? I mean he was OK but lost all the time.
 
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