How much does weight matter in grappling?

[theleerygoose]

Same answer as always, skill matters the most but size is also very relevant. If fighter 1 is a highly skilled 200 lb wrestler and fighter 2 is a highly skilled 175 lb wrestler, fighter 1 will win almost every time.

 

[wwkirk]

Back in pre-MMA days, there was the cliché that in Judo, one used one's opponent's size against them. They still promote this notion to some extent.

"Judo (Japanese for “the gentle way”) emphasizes winning in combat by using your opponent's weight and strength as weapons against him, while preserving your own mental and physical energy. It embodies the principle that good technique can win out over sheer strength."
https://www.fastcompany.com/43353/art-business-judo

 

[Iroh]

Start the video at 4:52 this small college wrestler is able to take down and defend takedowns by a 7ft 350lb guy from Africa.

Ha, yeah I've seen that before. People really underestimate technique and experience when it comes to wrestling.

 

[HuskySamoan]

Ha, yeah I've seen that before. People really underestimate technique and experience when it comes to wrestling.

I remember my grandfather and I got into a debate about WWF guys and he apparently had been a driver for Andre the Giant back in the day and was astonished by the guys size and told me that "you couldn't fight a man that size, he could grab your head with his hands and crush your skull" and I said something along the lines of "I bet Kurt Angle could double leg him into exhaustion and do a forearm trachea smash to choke him out". My grandfather thought I was nuts, it's interesting.

I guess fast forward and I still see MMA fans thinking this way and it's weird. Some 6'4 260lb gym rat will get absolutely dragged up and down the mats by a welterweight MMA fighter 9 times out of 10.

 

[Pequeño Corey]

Well they have weight classes in grappling tourneys and wrestling, so I guess it matters about as much as it does in boxing or MMA.

 

[colorles]

I remember my grandfather and I got into a debate about WWF guys and he apparently had been a driver for Andre the Giant back in the day and was astonished by the guys size and told me that "you couldn't fight a man that size, he could grab your head with his hands and crush your skull" and I said something along the lines of "I bet Kurt Angle could double leg him into exhaustion and do a forearm trachea smash to choke him out". My grandfather thought I was nuts, it's interesting.

I guess fast forward and I still see MMA fans thinking this way and it's weird. Some 6'4 260lb gym rat will get absolutely dragged up and down the mats by a welterweight MMA fighter 9 times out of 10.

Andre the Giant was a genuine "giant" with a massive frame size and massive hands. Daniel Cornier is a stocky, but not very large man. Very different.

Sheer weight, no matter the source, is at the very least an anchor. Having a heavy and sturdy anchor matters both in wrestling and in lifting anything. But actual bio mechanical strength comes from the frame, the attachments and lever points.

Point being: weight does matter; even if it's fat or water it still provides anchor. But frame and bio mechanical strength matters more if I had to chose between the two. Obviously, both are important for wrestling at the highest level; sumo wrestlers being an example of this.

Actually, on the topic of sumo wrestling: depending on the style, a complete fatass with a mediocre frame can be effecive. One of the current ozekis, Takakeisho, is as complete fatass with a mediocre frame, but is a pusher thruster and just has to be reasonalby explosive and push his oppenent out really fast. Daiesho is similiar. and they can be effective at this even against oppentents with much more imposing frames. With that said to be a muwashi fighter ie grab the muwashi (the "belt" the wrestlers wear), a wrestler has to have a big and imposing frame like Tochinoshin or newcomer Kinbozan.

To be honest, anybody interested in the importance of weight, or the weight vs frame size, or weight AND frame size topic, should watch some sumo wrestling. The March Tournament is almost over but not yet, can find the matches on youtube or the NHK network

 

[Rank Squatter]

Dewey Cooper

 

[LouisBolanos]

There's plenty of examples of small guys taking down enormous men and athletes too though, you sound silly.

Right "enormous guys" that have 50% more functional strength getting taken down by grapplers with 10x more skill, totally fair comparison. You sound silly. Try matching these grapplers against an animal that never trained a day in grappling but is literally 10x stronger, like a silverback and see how that goes. Gordon Ryan has 100x more grappling skill than an adult elephant, an adult elephant is 100x stronger and bigger than Gordon Ryan. What do you think happens when Gordon Ryan's sick ground game meets the elephant simply lying down on top of him? Gordon Ryan with his worthless BJJ gets crushed to death, that's what. Overwhelming skill means absolutely jack shit in the face of overwhelming strength and size.

Also Hongman Choi was a fucking wrestler in Korea you goof. He was an Ssireum national champion before he switched over to MMA and K1, which is similar to Sumo.

Did you actually watch his championship match or did you just use Google? Choi became champion by beating another equally gigantic, equally unskilled dude. To use this as "proof" to Choi's wrestling skills is about as stupid as using Bob Sapp's two wins against K-1 HW champion Ernesto Hoost as "proof" to his kickboxing skills. News flash: prime Bob Sapp had next to zero actual skills, he beat Hoost via strength and size, same thing with Choi, because strength and size when taken to the extreme stomps all over skills.

 

[markys00]

A ton..

GET IT?

 

[wolffanghameha]

I never saw or don't remember those fights, but besides weight and the striking threat, there's also how much they've practised that particular position. Fighter A could be very strong in 10% of positions and stalemate or beat Fighter B in those positions, even though Fighter B is better in the other 90% of positions.

Posts in this thread citing examples of trained vs untrained people or untrained vs untrained are probably irrelevant (so I won't bother sharing my experiences). Stipe and DC are both well-trained wrestlers and athletes.

 

[Dionysian]

Cool thread, because a lot of important points get made in these that aren't readily apparent to normal people.

TLDR: Depends if you get position on them or them on you.

Start the video at 4:52 this small college wrestler is able to take down and defend takedowns by a 7ft 350lb guy from Africa.

Excellent example. This 175 pound guy with superior technique is never in trouble. Because he never loses position. Shows how valuable wrestling is as the art of not losing position. That 7 foot guy can't get position to make those 130+ pounds matter.

Another good video. Check out 7:13 in particular. Gordon is the best grappler on the planet right now but when put in a negative position by a much, much bigger and much, much stronger guy (strongest in world? I don't keep up with these so let me know) he said it felt "terrible" and was tempted to tap just from pressure of having him in side control.


I'll add one too. Dustin, with better position, taps him out quickly due to vastly superior technique. This 400 pound behemoth, with better position, does the same to Dustin despite vastly inferior technique.

Dustin (props to the fucking balls to him for letting this ridiculous guy start in side control btw) lasts longer in the inferior position, but he literally taps eventually due to the body weight alone (echoing what Gordon said)

 

[Johnnny]

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

Throw in strikes and it matters a lot.

In pure bjj, unless skill levels are relatively equal, not as much.

 

[Bowel-forged Stool]

True. Grappling dominant fighters tend not to do well when moving up. Chris weidman and luke rockhold were big mws and could outgrapple the mws, but they couldnt at LHW.

They moved up and their chins got out grappled

 

[TriangleMonkey]

Weight classes are there for a reason

Striking and grappling


Technique will beat size until the person with size develops technique.

Two equally skilled people, the heavier/larger one has the advantage in combat

 

[Karelinator]

Cormier slammed Miocic because he had ideal single leg entry, together with bunch of other circumstances, like, Miocic grabbing him way too low on the body, basically laying himself on Cormier's back.

Nothing similar to such perfect opportunity had happened in other fights, and it made the difference, not the 12 pounds, heh.

 

[RizinSon88]

Conditioning and explosiveness also actor into this. Being huge and gassing out leaves one vulnerable. like others have said being a SHW slob at 330lbs. might give you a couple off minutes to get the job done vs a smaller better conditioned grappler. This was the case in some catch wrestling, just survive a bit and come on when he gets tired.

 

[Sticko]

Andre the Giant was a genuine "giant" with a massive frame size and massive hands. Daniel Cornier is a stocky, but not very large man. Very different.

Sheer weight, no matter the source, is at the very least an anchor. Having a heavy and sturdy anchor matters both in wrestling and in lifting anything. But actual bio mechanical strength comes from the frame, the attachments and lever points.

Point being: weight does matter; even if it's fat or water it still provides anchor. But frame and bio mechanical strength matters more if I had to chose between the two. Obviously, both are important for wrestling at the highest level; sumo wrestlers being an example of this.

Actually, on the topic of sumo wrestling: depending on the style, a complete fatass with a mediocre frame can be effecive. One of the current ozekis, Takakeisho, is as complete fatass with a mediocre frame, but is a pusher thruster and just has to be reasonalby explosive and push his oppenent out really fast. Daiesho is similiar. and they can be effective at this even against oppentents with much more imposing frames. With that said to be a muwashi fighter ie grab the muwashi (the "belt" the wrestlers wear), a wrestler has to have a big and imposing frame like Tochinoshin or newcomer Kinbozan.

To be honest, anybody interested in the importance of weight, or the weight vs frame size, or weight AND frame size topic, should watch some sumo wrestling. The March Tournament is almost over but not yet, can find the matches on youtube or the NHK network

Sumo wrestlers who fight on the mawashi don't need to be huge. Just look at Midorifuji who is the smallest man currently in the top division. Also Hoshoryu is great on the mawashi. He's bulked up a bit recently to 311 lbs but was under 300 a year ago.

 

[Reaperman]

It’s is huge. When I was in jiu jitsu as a purple belt, I could fend off my black belt instructor. After a while he could not submit me, and I could keep him at bay. He was a much superior grappler than me and he competed at a high level. I was just much bigger than him - I must have had about 50-60lbs on him, and was much stronger. Don’t get me wrong, I was always on the defensive and was not subbing him, but it was a much different experience than when I rolled with black belts that were as strong as me and were of similar weight…..

 

[Iroh]

I remember my grandfather and I got into a debate about WWF guys and he apparently had been a driver for Andre the Giant back in the day and was astonished by the guys size and told me that "you couldn't fight a man that size, he could grab your head with his hands and crush your skull" and I said something along the lines of "I bet Kurt Angle could double leg him into exhaustion and do a forearm trachea smash to choke him out". My grandfather thought I was nuts, it's interesting.

I guess fast forward and I still see MMA fans thinking this way and it's weird. Some 6'4 260lb gym rat will get absolutely dragged up and down the mats by a welterweight MMA fighter 9 times out of 10.

Yeah, my money would be on Kurt too. Lol . Mark Henry couldn't hold him when they were both training at the Olympic center and that man was/is truly ridiculously strong and a freak of nature in his own right. If you're as big as Andre and Kurt manages to keep getting you off balanced, you constantly have to exert ridiculous amounts of energy just to keep that huge mass up. And Andre doesn't have the muscular endurance of a real amateur wrestler. So he'd tire out much faster, than Angle. Angle is also much faster, so he would always be able to get in the most advantageous position, so that he has to exert the least amount of force to move Andre enough to bring him out off balance.

Which I wanted to add, people also underestimate the speed and wrestling specific endurance factors that are involved in wrestling. The default factors that are always mentioned are size and strength.