Is Maia/Shields the highest level grappling fight we've seen so far in MMA?

[ArtemV]

Ken Shamrock vs Kimbo Slice?

 

[screaminleeman]

I don't know what your obsession with Gonzaga is about but his ground game in MMA is spotty, sometimes he looks great and then other times he looks very bad.

Gonzaga is a much better grappler outside of MMA than he is in MMA.

Gonzaga is one of those guys that had much more talent than he actually showed in his fights, it is a shame he never trained with a top camp.

It is true that I do have MMA fighters among my "favorites" that are grossly one dimensional and or inconsistent. I can't help myself as I so enjoy the Mundials, BJJ world cup and ADCC and root for most of these athletes to transition successfully into MMA.

I am seriously curious to rewatch any MMA fighter that out grappled Gonzaga. I seriously only recall one fighter doing that, and it is my all time favorite Randy Couture, and even that was mainly GnP.

I just find watching the greatest submission grapplers (attempt) to compete in MMA fascinating. Werdum is seriously one of if not the most successful high level submission grappler (Fedor too) that truly transitioned from elite BJJ to elite MMA overall.

Pe De Pano & Gonzaga are as good or better in straight BJJ than Werdum, and none of them compare to Roger Gracie. Manbearpig transitioned to MMA better than Marcio or Roger.

Same can be said with my grappling background. Some very good Wrestlers have transitioned to MMA extremely effectively. There are at least a dozen FAR BETTER wrestlers than them that didn't make the transition well.

It (IMO) is like saying that James Toney's striking is pathetic because he didn't make it in MMA.

We are polar opposites. I watch every form of combat sport entertainment that I can get my hands on, and dream of seeing the best in the "individual" disciplines try their hand at MMA.

Brock got tooled by Stephen Neal in 1999 for the NCAA D1 HW championship in folkstyle wrestling and went on that year to win the gold medal in the freestyle wrestling world championship that year. I so wanted him to go into MMA, but the F'ing worthless NFL stole him from us.

I can't possibly give enough praise to the greatest in the individual disciplines trying their hand at MMA, and will ALWAYS have massive respect and appreciation of their effort regardless of the success of their x-over.

 

[Repsac]

As many others have said, Sakuraba-Newton and it's not even close.

 

[Repsac]

Me too.

I can't believe that nobody has mentioned either Werdum vs. Gonzaga I (and even 2). That grappling was brain melting enjoyment for me.

I love how Werdum is widely considered the best submission grappler in the UFC if not MMA overall, and yet in neither fight could he NOT get totally DOMINATED by the FAR SUPERIOR submission grappler in Gonzaga.

I guarantee 99.9999999% of Sherdog just read the result of the Jungle Fight contest, and watch the highlight 2nd round KO Werdum put Gonzaga down with and just assume he was also the better grappler.

Watch the damn fight(s) folks. Werdum has NOTHING for Gonzaga on the ground. NOTHING, he simply is NOT in that league grappling!

The fuck are you talking about. Just because Gonzaga got a full mount for a little while?

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

It is true that I do have MMA fighters among my "favorites" that are grossly one dimensional and or inconsistent. I can't help myself as I so enjoy the Mundials, BJJ world cup and ADCC and root for most of these athletes to transition successfully into MMA.

I am seriously curious to rewatch any MMA fighter that out grappled Gonzaga. I seriously only recall one fighter doing that, and it is my all time favorite Randy Couture, and even that was mainly GnP.

I just find watching the greatest submission grapplers (attempt) to compete in MMA fascinating. Werdum is seriously one of if not the most successful high level submission grappler (Fedor too) that truly transitioned from elite BJJ to elite MMA overall.

Pe De Pano & Gonzaga are as good or better in straight BJJ than Werdum, and none of them compare to Roger Gracie. Manbearpig transitioned to MMA better than Marcio or Roger.

Same can be said with my grappling background. Some very good Wrestlers have transitioned to MMA extremely effectively. There are at least a dozen FAR BETTER wrestlers than them that didn't make the transition well.

It (IMO) is like saying that James Toney's striking is pathetic because he didn't make it in MMA.

We are polar opposites. I watch every form of combat sport entertainment that I can get my hands on, and dream of seeing the best in the "individual" disciplines try their hand at MMA.

Brock got tooled by Stephen Neal in 1999 for the NCAA D1 HW championship in folkstyle wrestling and went on that year to win the gold medal in the freestyle wrestling world championship that year. I so wanted him to go into MMA, but the F'ing worthless NFL stole him from us.

I can't possibly give enough praise to the greatest in the individual disciplines trying their hand at MMA, and will ALWAYS have massive respect and appreciation of their effort regardless of the success of their x-over.

Ok, that makes more sense now, I didn't know you were that big of a fan of no-gi grappling. I used to wrestle so I like seeing wrestlers succeed but not all, I don't like the wrestlers that just want to be brawlers, I think BJJ compliments wrestling better than striking for most wrestlers.

Couture, Cro Cop hung with him then TKOed him, and Miocic took him down but it didn't really stay there, other than that no one has really gotten the better of him on the ground but he hasn't really dominated people on the ground badly either.

 

[adnatal]

No it wasn't.

The guy's just being an MMA hipster, complete lie

 

[BBMN]

i only saw the finish... was the grappling actually competitive? i should probably watch it.

It was hardly a fair fight. One guy was trying to rip out the other guy's eyeballs. This was a very bad match from a sporting perspective.

I was a huge Palhares defender until this match.

 

[jtruelove]

Back in Pride we saw a lot of pure grappling fights at a very high level.
The Gracie's and Sakuraba participated in many of those.

I think nowadays it's harder to have a MMA fight like Shields v Maia, where you have an even fight between two grapplers.

I honestly believe that Maia proves that old school style BJJ, where the fighter gets the takedowns from the clinch and always gets himself in an advantageous position on the ground, always forcing his opponent to be constantly defending against submission attempts, can still be very, very effective in today's MMA.

 

[arrelione]

Lewis vs Potts is an honorable mention.

 

[Greedy Dana]

The guy's just being an MMA hipster, complete lie

He's the same kinda guy that says
"I love watching Hendricks hold people against the cage bro, I love technique you're not a real MMA fan."