How many pure breed MMA fighters are elite level UFC fighters?

ProperLad said:
Wasn’t Rory one of the first true MMA fighters that wasn’t just a specialist and was pretty well rounded?
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He definitely got attention for that

I think it's probably the norm at this point, isn't it? I mean guys will often have a purple belt in BJJ or whatever but that's just trained to round out their MMA. A fair number of them are good wrestlers prior to entering MMA though - seems to be much harder to pick up wrestling later in the career

Personally I absolutely love it when we have a specialist going into MMA - your Gilbert Burns, Henry Cejudo, Khabib type guys who were the absolute top of their combat sport prior to entering MMA. I feel like that gets back to the roots of MMA of comparing different martial arts and seeing how they do
 
sb413197 said:
He definitely got attention for that

I think it's probably the norm at this point, isn't it? I mean guys will often have a purple belt in BJJ or whatever but that's just trained to round out their MMA. A fair number of them are good wrestlers prior to entering MMA though - seems to be much harder to pick up wrestling later in the career

Personally I absolutely love it when we have a specialist going into MMA - your Gilbert Burns, Henry Cejudo type guys who were the absolute top of their combat sport prior to entering MMA. I feel like that gets back to the roots of MMA of comparing different martial arts and seeing how they do
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Thé difference here is the wrestling background.
 
spacetime said:
Tim Sylvia is the most infamous one. I thought Whitaker would make that list too but he did 8 years of Karate as a kid. That has to count for something.

Are they all specialists transitioning to MMA and will this hold true in the future as well?
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Not sure if I understand, but I vote for Rory McDo
 
spacetime said:
And Ngannou, right? He clearly had no fundamentals from what little boxing he did before.
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Ngannou wanted to be a boxer first ; so it does not count :eek:
 
Very few, UFC and pure MMA gyms are pretty bad, coming from a base is the best.
 
This is definitely the right time and place to casually reuse racist language, OP.
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AmericanMMA said:
Him rocking that belt in public will never stop being funny to me. He went into the cage wearing his after one of Matt Hughes' wins. I was like whytf is he wearing his own belt to a teammates title defense? lol
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He used to show up to XFO shows wearing it back in the day
 
Stagliano said:
"Manuwa began training in mixed martial arts in 2007, following a weight lifting injury where he ruptured a chest muscle." Source wikipédia.

Jimi started MMA at 27 years old without any combat sports background lol. Then he became a top contenders in the best MMA organization for years.
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"Top Contender" is a bit of a stretch...
 
Unless you're a fast learner, it's better to go into MMA AFTER you've become proficient in at least one martial art. The best fighters are still guys who specialize and then tailor their MMA game around their unique style. People keep confusing specialist with being a one dimensional fighter. Just because you're a wrestler doesn't automatically make you Ben Askren, you could be DC or Cejudo.
 
arcadeperfect said:
Unless you're a fast learner, it's better to go into MMA AFTER you've become proficient in at least one martial art. The best fighters are still guys who specialize and then tailor their MMA game around their unique style. People keep confusing specialist with being a one dimensional fighter. Just because you're a wrestler doesn't automatically make you Ben Askren, you could be DC or Cejudo.
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That does seem to be the case. I guess GSP's wrestling is an exception
 
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