Volk is in that category of fighters who is not elite per say at any one particular discipline but he is extraordinarily good at foot work and fight IQ. That is even rarer than the likes of MM, GSP, JBJ, BJ, Fedor who are elite at more than 1 discipline. All of them started with a single MA as a base/foundation.
I dont think all those guys were elite at one discipline. GSP in particular I feel is more like hitting a checkbox.
Yes, Kyokushin Karate and he while he does credit it for helping his timing, nearly his entire skill set was crafted after he had turned pro in MMA. It would be an odd example to cite GSP as someone who mastered a martial art as proof that starting from one base will make someone better than someone who went into an MMA gym from the start. GSP was not a credentialed karateka, he was a hobbiest. Most of the things GSP learned were at tri-star, and his fighting style is reflective of that.
Demetris Johnson was only a high school wrestler, albeit a decent one. Again, nearly everything he learned was built from Matt Hume (who is an MMA coach), and his fighting style is highly reflective of that. I don't really think a couple of years of high school wrestling is enough to be considered serious mastery, especially considering how high level MMA training he had before turning pro.
But sure, if we want we can count Demetrius Johnson as a wrestler, although he really was not much of one (top 3 in Kentucky State - thats really not that great, it says more that he was just a great athlete more than anything). GSP though is a massive stretch.
Anyway, it is a minor point as most of the guys you cited turned pro in the 2000s when there wasn't much MMA infrastructure at all. Anderson Silva turned pro in 1997, so of course he did not start with MMA. But just felt like contesting that GSP really shouldn't be an example of how training in a martial art before going into MMA is evidence of how much more effective it is than just training MMA from the start.
IMO Van is not particularly elite. Fly W is shallow and has always been shallow. Van is one of my faves, cuz he is exciting and has guts but he got lucky vs Pantoja.
He is easily a top ten flyweight and is not in his prime yet. Whether he loses to Pantoja or not doesn't say anything other than Pantoja is an all time great.
Here are the top BW
Yan- base/elite at boxing
Merab- base/elite at wrestling
Sandhagen- base/ elite at kickboxing
Omalley- same as sandhagen though he went to mma sooner. Maybe he fits the mma from the start category
Umar - base / elite wrestler
Umar's base is Muay Thai, and he is not elite at either Muay Thai or wrestling. I'm not sure what ya mean by elite in general, because none of those guys were elite at their sports, though some of them have some amateur credentials.
I think you're greatly overlooking how common it is for guys to not have any serious background in another sport today. Here is the top 16 bantamweights, I will bold every single one who either started with MMA, started cross training right away, or started MMA with in a year or so after their "base".
- Petr Yan
- Merab Dvalishvili
- Umar Nurmagomedov
- Sean O'Malley
- Cory Sandhagen
- Song Yadong
- Aiemann Zahabi
- Deiveson Figueiredo
- Mario Bautista
- Marlon Vera
- David Martínez
- Payton Talbott* (just did high school wrestling and couldn't place in a weak state)
- Vinicius Oliveira
- Rob Font
- Kyler Phillips
BW is the most competitive division in the world, and probably the UFC also. You're not required to start in a martial art before cross training or switching into MMA.
From the past I can only think of Rory Mcdonald.
The reason why you can only think of Rory MacDonald is because he was specifically marketed as someone learning MMA from the ground up. It was a novelty back then. It's not a novelty anymore, so no one is going to do that. No one is going to say some guys base is MMA, so it is easy to overlook how many people started with cross training and not specializing.
Dustin Poirier is someone who is around Rory's age who started with MMA more or less. Though of course in the 2000s it was not common to start with MMA, there were not that many gyms yet.
Now if you go up in weight classes like MW, LHW, HW there are more top guys currently who fit in the mold of not elite at anything/trained mma early instead of becoming elite at 1 discipline... and those weight classes are all trash
I actually think it is the opposite. Usually the bigger weight classes have specialist because they are so lacking in skill, that a specialist can just get past their lack of defenses.
The lower weight classes people are significantly better trained and more well rounded. They tend to have crossed into MMA much earlier in their martial arts career, or just started with MMA in general.
