It's insane how "good" Tank Abbott was

Rvd Slmr said:
The early MMA/Vale Tudo scene was a lot smaller and it was often difficult to find legit opponents, but I still believe that fighters should be judged based on who they beat. Duarte had a big reputation, but the only thing that stuck in my mind was that ludicrous Kerr fight.
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God I'd repressed that fight. I think that's the single worst fight I've seen in my life.
 
pankrat said:
Tank Abbot at his absolute peak would stand a punchers chance against anyone you mentioned, a tiny one. He wasnt really good even by the standards of 1996

If HWs were so bad today you would not have strong 200+ lbers avoiding them through huge weightcuts

Tank Abbot was finished by WW/MW sized Oleg Taktarov and also lost to superheavyweight (uberfat) Scott Ferrozzo, who was miles away from UFC caliber
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Yeah, Tank had good power, but if he tried to brawl and go blow for blow with someone with the power, size and chin of Tai Tuivasa he'd get absolutely flatlined.
 
TRYHARD 2001 said:
Well, considering all he did in that fight to "win" was score a take down and get eye gouged, I'd say that fight really isn't a good example of his skill level, one way or the other. The ass-whoopings he caught from Tank, Kerr, and Schrijber (none of whom were great) tell me much more about how good he really was than a DQ win.


If you disagree with my assessment of Duarte please give me some examples of him puttin' a Luta Livre-style beatdown on somebody that mattered. Until then...
Tank-being-Tank.gif
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This is typical historical revision rubbish.
Looking at Duartes 'sherdog fightfinder' record is obviously limited since his Brazilian vale Tudo fights not there.

A few points
- there was no US MMA scene when Tank started fighting.

- The Gracies and Brazilian fighters were like gods of MMA at the time
For a guy to be associated with fighting Rickson at the time was like being seen as on the level of Daniel Cormier and Anderson Silva rolled into one.

- The Gracies were pushing their 'art' as the ultimate self defence style. A bs claim that even many today believe but obviously it is still great 1 vs 1, on soft mats, with no bystanders who might soccer kick you.

- Tank claimed to be the opposite (as mentioned he actually had wrestling and rudimentary boxing). But he had a bar fight background and his 'style' was made for that environment.
So him laying the smackdown in the UFC was a direct challenge to the martial arts world at the time.

- He achieved in 43 seconds, what apparently took Rickson ("the best fighter in the world") alot longer and promoted in most of their early Gracie self defence tapes as Rickson beating a top lutre livre fighter.

https://m.ok.ru/video/66649761390601-1

That alone should tell you what it meant someone whooping Duarte to the Brazilians and the MMA world in general, the only MMA scene along with the Russians and Japanese that really existed and mattered at the time.

Also as mentioned Tank beating the shit out of Frye before falling and getting tapped says alot about his level, Frye likewise considered the early US pioneer of a complete MMA fighter.
 
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TheMaster said:
This is typical historical revision rubbish.
Looking at Duartes 'sherdog fightfinder' record is obviously limited since his Brazilian vale Tudo fights not there.

A few points
- there was no US MMA scene when Tank started fighting.

- The Gracies and Brazilian fighters were like gods of MMA at the time
For a guy to be associated with fighting Rickson at the time was like being seen as on the level of Daniel Cormier and Anderson Silva rolled into one.

- The Gracies were pushing their 'art' as the ultimate self defence style. A bs claim that even many today believe but obviously it is still great 1 vs 1, on soft mats, with no bystanders who might soccer kick you.

- Tank claimed to be the opposite (as mentioned he actually had wrestling and rudimentary boxing). But he had a bar fight background and his 'style' was made for that environment.
So him laying the smackdown in the UFC was a direct challenge to the martial arts world at the time.

- He achieved in 43 seconds, what apparently took Rickson ("the best fighter in the world") alot longer and promoted in most of their early Gracie self defence tapes as Rickson beating a top lutre livre fighter.

https://m.ok.ru/video/66649761390601-1

That alone should tell you what it meant someone whooping Duarte to the Brazilians and the MMA world in general, the only MMA scene along with the Russians and Japanese that really existed and mattered at the time.

Also as mentioned Tank beating the shit out of Frye before falling and getting tapped says alot about his level, Frye likewise considered the early US pioneer of a complete MMA fighter.
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Tank also gave Pedro Rizzo at his peak a very tough go.
Rizzo was unquestionably a top full sized HW and Abbot was tagging him standing and taking him down and keeping him there. It was a standup referee what preceeded the end of the fight.

Tank was losing anyways due to his awful endurance but still, he was getting the better of Pedro for 8 minuts of fighting, how can anybody say that guy wasn't even "okay" by the standards of the time
 
baiguishishenme said:
Tank was actually one of the first mma fighters with a diverse set of skills. He was a wrestler in college and had boxing training.
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Oh shit, didn't know he wrestled. Would of never guessed it watching his fights.
 
apap said:
Oh shit, didn't know he wrestled. Would of never guessed it watching his fights.
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Tank wrestled UFC HW champion Pedro Rizzo pretty well until running out of gas as always. Hit a nice outside trip on him if iirc. Rizzo only got back to his feet with a standup from the referee. Rizzo wasnt a noob dojo artist from the early UFCs; he was a legit elite modern fighter.
 
Tank gets a lot of shit because when he didn't show up, he sucked. He was almost never in shape and training. And out of shape for Tank is a lot worse than just not training, it's probably being on a bender that would make look sober.You gotta remember this is a guy that has a liver transplant.

But when he did show up, for those fights where he made his name, those that saw him know he was one of the best in the world at that time. IMO he could still compete in the UFC today if he had sub defense.
 
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You can't look at records in the 1990s. You have to really watch all the fights to know the fighters and where they stand.

In the 1990s, everyone was so 1 dimensional (styles make fights) and the sport was evolving so fast that all the greats look like they're terrible, on their records.

No one was well rounded then; everyone had either paper, scissors, or rock. And even the best paper in the world was going to lose lots of fights to mediocre or bum level scissors.

The sport was evolving fast too; the most skilled guy in the world in 1993, Royce Gracie, fought like a bum by 1997.

Guys like Mark Kerr, Maurice Smith, Gary Goodridge, Pete Williams, etc. look like bums if you look at their records. All these guys are legends or are close to being legends.

Tank's not a great but he was very good and much better than his record or his bad fights show you.
 
superpunch said:
You can't look at records in the 1990s. You have to really watch all the fights to know the fighters and where they stand.

In the 1990s, everyone was so 1 dimensional (styles make fights) and the sport was evolving so fast that all the greats look like they're terrible, on their records.

No one was well rounded then; everyone had either paper, scissors, or rock. And even the best paper in the world was going to lose lots of fights to mediocre or bum level scissors.

The sport was evolving fast too; the most skilled guy in the world in 1993, Royce Gracie, fought like a bum by 1997.

Guys like Mark Kerr, Maurice Smith, Gary Goodridge, Pete Williams, etc. look like bums if you look at their records. All these guys are legends or are close to being legends.

Tank's not a great but he was very good and much better than his record or his bad fights show you.
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Not true that every fighter was one dimensional in the 90s; maybe in early UFC events but definitely not in the heyday of Vale Tudo and the pro circuits in Japan, USA and Russia during '95 -'00 with the consequent crosstraining gyms.

Tank actually gave very tough fights to Taktarov, Frye, Rizzo, and Maurice Smith, none of them were cueless anywhere.


I'd say Kerr is not far from bum, more so considering his hype, and I'd place his name behind the guys you mention. Definitely not a legend in my book, he doest have many good wins, enjoyed and absurb weight advantage over his opponents, was a gross steroid abuser, or just the skills displayed by him even in the win IMHO.
 
Tank Abbott, the redneck that would walk into UFC ring after a heavy drinking session at a local dive bar....

He would definitely whip a good portion of UFC HW bums that populate the division.

Entertainment at its finest.
 
pankrat said:
Not true that every fighter was one dimensional in the 90s; maybe in early UFC events but definitely not in the heyday of Vale Tudo and the pro circuits in Japan, USA and Russia during '95 -'00 with the consequent crosstraining gyms.

Tank actually gave very tough fights to Taktarov, Frye, Rizzo, and Maurice Smith, none of them were cueless anywhere.


I'd say Kerr is not far from bum, more so considering his hype, and I'd place his name behind the guys you mention. Definitely not a legend in my book, he doest have many good wins, enjoyed and absurb weight advantage over his opponents, was a gross steroid abuser, or just the skills displayed by him even in the win IMHO.
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Yes, guys like Takatarov and Ruas and Rizzo were basically 'modern' well rounded fighters and products of Vale Tudo and Russian combat Sambo which is basically a form of MMA anyway that has been around for 70 years.
Then you had Ken coming in from Pancrase which was a form of MMA also.

It was only the US fighters that were mainly one dimensional apart from standouts like Frye who had wrestling, Judo and boxing.
Since the sport didn't exist in the US at the time we had pure karate and ninjitsu guys coming out to do their thing as the Gracies organized 'pure style vs style' to sell the world that the one dimensional BJJ was the best single art.

Actually either Frye or Tank would've been terrible matchups for Royce since they had ko power and could force the fight to be standup.
If Tank had gotten a shot at Royce and kod him imagine his rep now- the gracies stayed well away especially after how Royce did against street fighter Kimo.

It was ironic that when an old Tank fought Kimo years later Kimo who had now trained BJJ got a simple takedown and submission.
If Tank had kept up and leaned the basics of submission defence he could've had more success on his return.

But in his prime he did very well against legit well rounded MMA fighters of the era.
 
sb413197 said:
Yeah I mean I guess it's possible - maybe equating to a 550 strict paused bench which isn't totally impossible, but it is really REALLY good, particularly at that point in time when there weren't a whole lot of guys benching much over 600 raw. Just seems weird that he would be quite literally one of the strongest benchers in the world, particularly considering that he wasn't all that big compared to the really big benchers.

I don't doubt he was benching, but I doubt it was that much. Maybe 405 with a few fake plates or something.
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Do you think fake plates existed back then. I thought they are quite recent, a product of of instaidiots pretending to be stronger than they are
 
He was one of the first guys comin in there with insane ko power.
 
Hellowhosthat said:
Yeah, Tank had good power, but if he tried to brawl and go blow for blow with someone with the power, size and chin of Tai Tuivasa he'd get absolutely flatlined.
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Tuivasa v Tank, yeah I'm interested in that fight, those dudes aren't too different from each other really.
 
The Tank that fought Kimbo didn't count. He didn't train and was a lot smaller. The Tank in the early UFC was scary. He was 280 and benched 600lbs.
 
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