Is this an A level athlete?

[panamaican]

A-level athletes make better fighters, if everything else is the same.

This is the same in every sport. Sure, things like mental toughness, intelligence, etc. are all very important. But if you have 2 guys with the same mental toughness, the same intelligence and one has better athletic ability then after equal amounts of training - the better athlete will be better at the sport, no matter what sport it is.

This "athleticism doesn't matter" mentality in MMA is just weird since in every other combat sport, they acknowledge that better athletes are better fighters. Whether it's judo, MT, boxing, etc. they all value athleticism. But MMA suddenly believes it's irrelevant, just weird.

 

[Lucifer Alpha]

What is an A level athlete?

 

[HuntoGoato]

Biggest difference between sports like Football and basketball..you must be A level athlete to excel (plus other tangibles). In MMA, you do not have to be A level athlete to be successful (i.e. Fedor, Hunt, etc). MMA takes a lot of mental as well as being one tough sob, not saying other big sports do not have those because they def do but I am not sure as much. This is coming from a former d2 college basketball player (4x letterwinner and1st team all conference senior year). I just know there is a huge gap of athleticism between basketball/football to MMA (not sure about baseball).

 

[tombombadil]

Canseco is A level, right?

Haha! That's funny, I never thought of this one, and of course he is - he can swing a bat better than 99.9% of the planet!

 

[Crimson Glory]

JJ Watt is a better football player than Brock because JJ Watt is a football player; Brock was a wrestler who tried to get into the NFL with no experience, just for the hell of it. The reason he didn't make it had nothing to do with athleticism, and everything to do with not being a football player to begin with, ie having the sport-specific iq and skills necessary to succeed at it. The same way if JJ tried to make it in wrestling in his 20's, he would've gotten his ass handed to him by guys that would never even sniff the Olympics, let alone medal at them. Both great athletes, but tying to compare their athletic abilities by comparing how they did in a single sport only one of them competed in is asinine.

This guy knows.

 

[HuntoGoato]

Canseco is A level, right?

Funny that you are the one always bringing up prime talk with excuses for Fedor losses but you will be the first one to post some shit like this. Of course Jose Canseco was WAY out of his prime and 45 years old with 0 fight experience, undoubtedly even a can like HMC would beat him. Shit post is shit post.

Hypocritical much?

 

[Melas Chasma]

Im not really sure if you are joking. I can still do around 80-90 with using only knees and I played like a year soccer as a kid. Im guessing you are an american if you thought thats impressive what Jose and Florian showed there.

 

[Lucifer Alpha]

Im not really sure if you are joking. I can still do around 80-90 with using only knees and I played like a year soccer as a kid. Im guessing you are an american if you thought thats impressive what Jose and Florian showed there.

It was a joke. On Sherdog, you have to do something with a ball to be considered an A-level athlete.

 

[KONG-D'SNT-TAP]

Lesnar came in the sport old and worn out and win the belt.

A 25 year old Watt would hold the belt with two years training.

He would out class people all over the place.

 

[KONG-D'SNT-TAP]

I also love how keyboard warriors liek this site has thinks being an NFL defensive end requires no cardio.

You Fn tools are laughable and have never played a minute of sports.

 

[KONG-D'SNT-TAP]

So despite the numbers posted, which are the only actual data we have to physically compare the two, you are basically just going to say "I don't care about the information we have at hand because I just know Watt is a better athlete and that's that".

Come on man.

Well Brock was In the combine at an older age than Watt.

And the numbers are similar but now Watt would put up better numbers across the board. He's only gotten better since the combine.

 

[Melas Chasma]

It was a joke. On Sherdog, you have to do something with a ball to be considered an A-level athlete.

Ok. I was actually suprised to see that, because Rogan was always bringing up their soccer backgrounds, so I thought they probably were decent players. It really looks like they suck at soccer, lol.

 

[AndrewGolota48]

A level athletes have actually been worse at MMA oddly enough. Mitrione was a bench warmer yet was a way better fighter than solid starting players like Marcus Jones and Johnnie Morton with the same level of experience. He was simply much more of a natural fighter from the get go, despite being the inferior NFL athlete.

And yes Brock is on a similar athletic level as Watt, but didn't play football his until he was fucking 26. Let Watt go try to wrestle in the Olympics with no experience and see how well he does. According to Sherdog, if he was THAT freaky of an athlete he'd be in the NBA making more money without having to play a sport that causes brain damage and leaves half the athletes virtually crippled at the end of their career.

Fact is Brock was A level AND had a lifetime of wrestling and was still not able to become an unbeatable champ the way these other athletes supposedly would. You honestly sound like children worshipping their favorite superheroes.

 

[Paradigm]

GOATS have difficulty jumping I guess.

damn...where is that Conor footage from?

 

[AndrewGolota48]

Well Brock was In the combine at an older age than Watt.

And the numbers are similar but now Watt would put up better numbers across the board. He's only gotten better since the combine.

So your theory is that only Watt would get better at benching, running, and jumping by specifically training those things for years...Brock would clearly not improve at those activities if he focused his training on them for years...makes sense.

 

[KONG-D'SNT-TAP]

So your theory is that only Watt would get better at benching, running, and jumping by specifically training those things for years...Brock would clearly not improve at those activities if he focused his training on them for years...makes sense.

I never said that now did I. No I didnt.


Brock is a great athlete I never said he wasn't but Watt is just on another level than he is.

And Brock would've been a great NFL player had he done it from a younger age.

 

[MagnusGOAT]

damn...where is that Conor footage from?

From when he was in LA. He later made the jump at night, but has awful technique when he tried it first. Surprised you haven't seen it because that's pretty much all Conor's haters use to deny his athletic ability.

 

[Sgt Smith]

I also love how keyboard warriors liek this site has thinks being an NFL defensive end requires no cardio.

You Fn tools are laughable and have never played a minute of sports.

You are right, it requires a lot more cardio than people are giving creedence. But you are also wrong, for assuming that the only thing needed to excel at combat sports is greater athleticism. Have you ever fought? Getting cracked by a big hitter will change your composure in a heartbeat.

 

[quebert]

The only reason Btock didn't end up in the NFL was he didn't know plays. They wanted him to go play overseas for a few years and he would have had a spot on the Vikings. His combine numbers are imho much more impressive than JJ's simply because of the age difference, and the fact Brock hadn't played ball so doing the drills were pretty forgine to him. A much younger guy with a football background basically matched Lesnar's combine numbers. Both are A level athletes, but had Brock played football in high school and entered the Combine when he was 21, it would have been a different story stat wise.

 

[KONG-D'SNT-TAP]

You are right, it requires a lot more cardio than people are giving creedence. But you are also wrong, for assuming that the only thing needed to excel at combat sports is greater athleticism. Have you ever fought? Getting cracked by a big hitter will change your composure in a heartbeat.

Face it MMA will never have elite athletes in the sport.

Once in awhile well get a guy here or there but never the way other sports gets elite athletes.