Is Brave-Royler 1 the greatest grappling upset of all time?

JustOnce

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So, from my own knowledge, I think I might be wrong on this but the greatest freestyle wrestling upset that I can recall is Slay beating Saitiev, likely the greatest freestyle wrestler of all time, which is probably way less of an upset than Rulon over Karelin, the consensus greatest greco-roman wrestler of all time.

When it comes to Judo, I'm not a big Judo guy so I can't say for sure, but Riner losing his 10 year unbeaten streak to Kageura was a huge upset too. When it comes to Sambo, once again I'm not the biggest Sambo guy around, but Ivanov beating Fedor was probably a huge upset there as well.

So what I have is

Freestyle: Slay over Saitiev
Greco: Rulon over Karelin
Judo: Kageura over Reiner
Sambo: Ivanov over Fedor

Would Bravo subbing Royler when he was just brown belt triumph all these as the greatest grappling upset of all time?
 
So, from my own knowledge, I think I might be wrong on this but the greatest freestyle wrestling upset that I can recall is Slay beating Saitiev, likely the greatest freestyle wrestler of all time, which is probably way less of an upset than Rulon over Karelin, the consensus greatest greco-roman wrestler of all time.

When it comes to Judo, I'm not a big Judo guy so I can't say for sure, but Riner losing his 10 year unbeaten streak to Kageura was a huge upset too. When it comes to Sambo, once again I'm not the biggest Sambo guy around, but Ivanov beating Fedor was probably a huge upset there as well.

So what I have is

Freestyle: Slay over Saitiev
Greco: Rulon over Karelin
Judo: Kageura over Reiner
Sambo: Ivanov over Fedor

Would Bravo subbing Royler when he was just brown belt triumph all these as the greatest grappling upset of all time?


Bro.

Everyone knows Kimura over Helio was the grappling upset of the millennium. Just because Kimura was 400 lbs and in his prime as the reigning world champion of Judo doesn't mean he should have stood a chance against the world openweight jiu jitsu champ in Helio, despite him being frail and weak at 110 lbs. Helio modified the crude, strength-based techniques of Judo so the smaller man could employ leverage and strategy to win.
 
Matt Serra vs Marcio Feitoza

Not talking about the outcome (mysterious decision) or fight itself (Brazilian world champ was completely dominated by some pizza craving dude from New York), but the fact that this grappling bout was erased from history by invisible world handlers.
 
Bro.

Everyone knows Kimura over Helio was the grappling upset of the millennium. Just because Kimura was 400 lbs and in his prime as the reigning world champion of Judo doesn't mean he should have stood a chance against the world openweight jiu jitsu champ in Helio, despite him being frail and weak at 110 lbs. Helio modified the crude, strength-based techniques of Judo so the smaller man could employ leverage and strategy to win.

Three times the size
 
Matt Serra vs Marcio Feitoza

Not talking about the outcome (mysterious decision) or fight itself (Brazilian world champ was completely dominated by some pizza craving dude from New York), but the fact that this grappling bout was erased from history by invisible world handlers.

I thought Serra lost intentionally or something, but haven't watched the bout. I don't think it's on Youtube
 
Bro.

Everyone knows Kimura over Helio was the grappling upset of the millennium. Just because Kimura was 400 lbs and in his prime as the reigning world champion of Judo doesn't mean he should have stood a chance against the world openweight jiu jitsu champ in Helio, despite him being frail and weak at 110 lbs. Helio modified the crude, strength-based techniques of Judo so the smaller man could employ leverage and strategy to win.
What the hell are you talking about man, there was no upset.

Everyone knows that Helio won because Kimura could not make him submit in less than three minutes and he did not surrender even with a broken arm, therefore it's a moral victory.
 
Pablo Popovitch beating Marcelo at ADCC?

Other Marcelo upsets would be when he lost to Michael Langhi and Cameron Earle.
 
What the hell are you talking about man, there was no upset.

Everyone knows that Helio won because Kimura could not make him submit in less than three minutes and he did not surrender even with a broken arm, therefore it's a moral victory.

While this is true, the moral victory was already secured after 3 minutes - I was referring to the controversial arm break that occurred after regulation time.

Helio was taken by surprise when Kimura refused to concede, but took the 800 lbs Judo brute's treachery in stride. Knowing he was already up 1-0, Helio then allowed the Japanese behemoth to throw him repeatedly, demonstrating his own mastery of ukemi. When Kimura became frustrated and unable to gain the upper hand, the Brazilian wizard allowed his arm to be broken, putting the contest at 1-1 in order to make it a fair fight heading into the third period.

Unfortunately, Helio's corner was unfamiliar with the rules and threw in the towel. While Helio stood ready to continue the contest and finish the trilogy, the Japanese Brazilians in the arena ran onto the mat, hoisted their hero onto their shoulders and shepherded him away before he could further disgrace their art.
 
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Bravo and Royler is def up there. I don’t know about overall grappling when you take in judo, wrestling, etc but it’s definitely one of the biggest submission grappling upsets I can think of.

I just got into the the sport around that time and it was a huge deal.
 
I didn't realize how huge Slay's win was. I wrestled more in Amarillo than anywhere else in the years before and after his victory, we were both born there. I kind of always took it for granted. Pretty cool to think Amarillo with a population of less than 200,000 has produced an Olympic gold medalist, a UFC champion, and two NWA world champions.
 
I thought Serra lost intentionally or something, but haven't watched the bout. I don't think it's on Youtube


You've been misinformed too. There was another adcc match where Feitoza intentionally gave a win to his older barra teammate. Serra vs Feitoza was a hard fought competition. All the Brazilian was doing during the fight was defending.
 
Bro.

Everyone knows Kimura over Helio was the grappling upset of the millennium. Just because Kimura was 400 lbs and in his prime as the reigning world champion of Judo doesn't mean he should have stood a chance against the world openweight jiu jitsu champ in Helio, despite him being frail and weak at 110 lbs. Helio modified the crude, strength-based techniques of Judo so the smaller man could employ leverage and strategy to win.

Except Kimura was 400 kgs, whereas Helio was 110 pounds fully dressed. Details are important, you should try to get them right.
 
Pablo Popovitch beating Marcelo at ADCC?

Other Marcelo upsets would be when he lost to Michael Langhi and Cameron Earle.

The other losses diminishes Pablo's win. TBH, Marcelo was great but he took Ls. Not many, but he took them.
 
Except Kimura was 400 kgs

You are correct and this was an oversight. In my follow up post I rounded down to 800 lbs out of consideration for Kimura's moral defeat.

Helio was 110 pounds fully dressed.

While true, this was not to be publicly revealed. Born sickly and frail, Helio achieved an adult weight of only 98 lbs. But the master was prideful and before fights, was known to drink a gallon of water and to weigh in with gourds hidden in his clothing. A triple digit weigh in was strong and thought to carry mystical significance.
 
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You are correct and this was an oversight. In my follow up post I rounded down to 800 lbs out of consideration for Kimura's moral defeat.



While true, this was not to be publicly revealed. Born sickly and frail, Helio achieved an adult weight of only 98 lbs. But the master was prideful and before fights, was known to drink a gallon of water and to weigh in with gourds hidden in his clothing. A triple digit weigh in was strong and thought to carry mystical significance.
Jokes aside, does anyone know how much Helio really weighted at the time?
Because we all know that the Gracie likes to exaggerate how weak and frail he was and the size difference between him and his opponents, but to be fair he really looked like a toothpick in all the old black and white videos that I saw.
 
Jokes aside, does anyone know how much Helio really weighted at the time?
Because we all know that the Gracie likes to exaggerate how weak and frail he was and the size difference between him and his opponents, but to be fair he really looked like a toothpick in all the old black and white videos that I saw.
I don't know, he never looked nearly as frail as they hyped him up to be. In fact, I think he was a high-level swimmer or something like that, if I'm not mistaken. I'll say this, looking at Kimura, who was about 5'7 and 180-something, Helio did not look significantly smaller to me. I mean, he was definnitely taller. Of course he wasn't nearly as muscular as Kimura, but he wasn't that much smaller either IMO.
 

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