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Back in 1997 boxer Laverne Clark made his debut into mma.
Boxing out of the midwest he was struggling to find meaningful fights in boxing.
An opportunity presented itself in a striker vs grappler match up on Extreme Challenge 4 - Clark's first mma fight.
His opponent was a grappler named Shonie Carter making his debut as well (which is only based off of arbitrarily stating what was and was not considered an mma fight back then).
Shonie Carter was an accomplished wrestler. Started wrestling while in grade school and by the time he was in college (U of Tenn) he was doing wrestling/judo and bjj.
In 95 or 96 he was at the olympic trials for the wrestling team.
His match against Laverne Clark was supposed to be a walk through.
This was 1997 and striking wasn't considered effective in this format. Certainly not if striking was your main weapon. Liddell wouldn't be on the scene for about another year (1998).... and Maurice Smith's gift (shock) to the mma world wouldn't be felt for about a half a year later when he would beat grappler Mark Coleman.
This isn't to say that guys like Victor Belforte and Don Frye didn't use their hands effectively - but no one viewed them as strikers.... they were grapplers who could strike. The distinction was much more prevalent back in those days. Hell, sherdog's forums main break used to be UFC/MMA/Grappling as one forum and the hodge podge "Striking" forum as the other.
Laverne Clark was a boxer first and he was supposed to be Shonie Carter's toy for that fight. That is, until the fight actually started (and quickly ended).
Carter was so impressed with Clark that the very next day (or, very next days) after it he started incorporating boxing (and kickboxing) into his training.
So, here's their fight (around 3:09):
Boxing out of the midwest he was struggling to find meaningful fights in boxing.
An opportunity presented itself in a striker vs grappler match up on Extreme Challenge 4 - Clark's first mma fight.
His opponent was a grappler named Shonie Carter making his debut as well (which is only based off of arbitrarily stating what was and was not considered an mma fight back then).
Shonie Carter was an accomplished wrestler. Started wrestling while in grade school and by the time he was in college (U of Tenn) he was doing wrestling/judo and bjj.
In 95 or 96 he was at the olympic trials for the wrestling team.
His match against Laverne Clark was supposed to be a walk through.
This was 1997 and striking wasn't considered effective in this format. Certainly not if striking was your main weapon. Liddell wouldn't be on the scene for about another year (1998).... and Maurice Smith's gift (shock) to the mma world wouldn't be felt for about a half a year later when he would beat grappler Mark Coleman.
This isn't to say that guys like Victor Belforte and Don Frye didn't use their hands effectively - but no one viewed them as strikers.... they were grapplers who could strike. The distinction was much more prevalent back in those days. Hell, sherdog's forums main break used to be UFC/MMA/Grappling as one forum and the hodge podge "Striking" forum as the other.
Laverne Clark was a boxer first and he was supposed to be Shonie Carter's toy for that fight. That is, until the fight actually started (and quickly ended).
Carter was so impressed with Clark that the very next day (or, very next days) after it he started incorporating boxing (and kickboxing) into his training.
So, here's their fight (around 3:09):