[Opinion] Gane proves A level athlete hypothesis

[sonhow]

The memo was if Lebron trained six moths RIGHT NOW hed be champ..not young age. Heck I could have been a world champ if I trained the right way from age 3 and didnt have problem with throwing punches to other people and if a bear had sex with a moose at the right time or a butterfly flew to some wrong window and got smeshed,..
Its basically a butterfly effect where we all live in different dimensions

 

[Izzysexboyfriend]

Being a good football player is not necessarily indicative of anything but being good at a single job. An extreme example is the kicker - he's good at ... kicking and punting the ball. A defensive tight end is maybe good at spinning and juking people out and grabbing a dude. So again not the best example of athleticism

Compare the guy who's good at doing one thing to LeBron who can jump 4 feet high and is jacked and moves like a freight train and can probably play any sport he wants.

Lebron is juiced though

 

[Izzysexboyfriend]

Was Greg hardy considered athletic? I don't watch football but know about his NFL and wife beating background

He was athletic but he’s proof being athletic in one sport doesn’t translate to another sport. Was Hardys hands faster than anyone else or was he stronger than other heavyweights? Not really

 

[HHJ]

I mean he was doing fine against Ngannou until he got taken down. Just his footwork alone was making Francis gas out. Thats how you know Big Frank is gonna get killed in Boxing.

 

[omawho402]

Lebron could be an offensive powerhouse in mma, durability would be the question though and there is only one way to test that so we'll never know

 

[nostradumbass]

He already did play other sports and wasn't good enough to do it professionally, hence starting muay thai as an adult.

So Hardy's not an A level athlete because his position required "brute strength", but Ngannou is an A level athlete because of all his agility and slick head movement?

 

[FIghtxIQ]

You will get a lot of hate on this thread but athleticism does factor in with fighting skills. There are a lot of fighters that are more athlete type than natural fighter type. So for people to think athleticism doesn't factor in, it does. Of course mentality matters as well and some fighters with more of a fighter's mentality will be able to beat better skilled and more athletic fighters with grit and killer instinct. But I'm sure the point of this thread is that A-Level athleticism with that mindset. There are many in NBA/NFL past and present that have that type of mindset, but they don't have the fight/mma training.

If you look at the pool of people that are in mma, they come from all over the place and many different careers and professions, to think that A-Level athletes can't do as well or better than other mma fighters that come from zero sports and combat sports background is not the right type of thinking. You have many mma fighters come in with zero martial arts, combat sports, and team sports background and do well in mma. They just started training it and started fighting.

 

[MeatWagon06]

Have you ever seen Jones dunk a basketball? He's a true A+ lvl athlete.

 

[GUY]

if you went back in time and put everyone currently in the NBA training MMA since they were 10, I think you would have a totally different HW top 10 right now. That being said, not all of them would make the cut, some would excel at athleticism but not at the other skills required to be a fighter. You would see fatass Tuivasa KOing some of these dudes.

 

[joeson]

Age, transferable skills and physical attributes are all factors in determining how successful someone is in crossing over from a different sport or starting MMA.

Gane’s athleticism plays a big part of why he is successful at MMA but it’s not the only reason. It’s also because he started training Muay Thai, one of the base arts of MMA, at 24. Not young but not old either. He then switched to MMA at 28 after a championship run in Muay Thai. He came to MMA with a ton of transferable skills, before he was old and his reflexes shot, while his mind was still pliable. Add that to his size, speed and the fact that he competes in a relatively shallow division where physicality counts for more and you have the right combination to potentially be very successful.

Greg Hardy was also 28 when he stared training MMA but he had less transferable skills. What is he going to take from football? He had to learn everything from scratch at 28. Then there is his physical traits. He’s massive but he doesn’t have the one punch KO power or the strength of an Ngannou or the speed and footwork of a Gane. Add all of that to his poor cardio and it becomes pretty obvious he wasn’t going to go very far.

Would Lebron be successful at MMA? Certainly not if he were to cross over now or even a decade ago. He would need to start in a related sport in his early-mid 20’s and be successful at that before you can even guess at how he would do. There isn’t enough you can glean from a successful basketball career to say how he would do in a completely different sport. Michael Jordon was the GOAT in basketball but couldn’t even make the majors in baseball.

 

[Johnnny]

To an extent, at least. He is a tremendous athlete that could have played any sport. Basketball, soccer, football.

That is demonstrably false. Gane played basketball and soccer as a youth in the French system. He simply wasn't good enough to progress in either. That is why he spent the first half of his twenties working regular jobs.

At age 26, Gane had a very average physique.

But when he showed up on the regional MMA in 2018, he had added an unusual amount of muscle mass in only 2 years.

 

[RemyR]

Let's be real, being able to take a punch is an overrated skill. Any guy who is fighting to put food on the table will put his body on the line. LeBron just so happens to be a guy with options, so he wouldn't want to get punched in the head for 20 k.

this is one of the worst takes I've read in a while

bravo

 

[Captain Herb]

Gane isn’t A level

Compared to Jones he is. You saw what happened when he fought college safety Dominick Reyes. The better athlete chased him around the cage.

 

[wwkirk]

Gane hasn't proven anything yet, and he isn't even "A-level," or he would be playing football or basketball.

^ This
Gane is a useless example for the A-level athlete thesis since by definition he doesn't fall within the category.

 

[weaselkenievil]

I wonder why A level athletes only belong to NFL and NBA...it's almost like no other country in the world can produce one. Unless they end up moving to the US and playing in the NFL or NBA of course, suddenly they can be A level then...

 

[capo245]

I wonder why A level athletes only belong to NFL and NBA...it's almost like no other country in the world can produce one. Unless they end up moving to the US and playing in the NFL or NBA of course, suddenly they can be A level then...

Id say these are b or c, soccer is all a level athletes, swimming, gymnastics, handball, cricket even chess(iq wise) since they all have a larger talent pool.

 

[GBJohn]

TS's assessment of what is required to play defensive end is patently inaccurate. Not knowing the name of the position casts doubt on any assertions he might make as to what it takes to play it. NFL level defensive end requires power, speed, and coordination, all at a high level. Cardio is of a different type; burst, rest, burst, rest. It's not the same as a marathon runner's cardio, but to say cardio doesn't matter shows a lack of knowledge. Unfortunately, that type of cardio isn't one hundred percent applicable to MMA.
In Hardy's case, he came late to the sport, so his skills were a bit behind. His cardio was bad, but there aren't a lot of guys his size with better cardio. Personally, I believe he thought he could just overwhelm guys with physicality and power, but that didn't work out well with even lower-level UFC fighters.

 

[kyunghee]

He proves the "Heavyweight is a lesser division" hypothesis.

 

[Human Bass]

Well, at least mma being a barefoot sport, it preserves the feet way better than basketball awful shoes

 

[fizzlehiss]

To an extent, at least. He is a tremendous athlete that could have played any sport. Basketball, soccer, football. Yet he chose muay Thai at a fairly advanced stage in his life, and now he's fighting for the HW belt. He clowns everyone in the division besides the other A level athlete Ngannou.

Hardy was not an A level athlete, since being a defensive tight end only requires a sort of brute strength and not much else. So don't use him as a counter example.

Fact remains, if LeBron was trained to fight MMA from a relative young age, he would destroy everyone including Ngannou. I could see him finishing Ngannou in particular with a judo slam into heavy, vicious GnP. Almost like the Jon Jones of the HW division but with scary athleticism .

Gane will destroy Jones too I'm afraid, as Jon is no A level athlete

Soccer?