Takanori Gomi...

The Natural Born Runner

The Natural Born Runner

Banned
Banned
Joined
Dec 30, 2015
Messages
18,460
Reaction score
0
I've always thought this, but is it possible that this guy is/was a little overrated?

It just seems the minute he stepped on US soil, his mystique and his world class level of fighting just evaporated. It's an odd one, almost as bad as Kid Yamamoto.

Gomi without a shadow of a doubt is a legend, and one of the best Lightweights to ever fight in MMA. His record and his early win streaks are not something you see a lot in MMA full stop, never mind in the Lightweight division.

He is 37 now, which is extremely long in the tooth for a Lightweight, but losses like the below are hardly those of legends:

1st Round - KO - Joe Lauzon
1st Round - KO - Miles Jury
1st Round - Submission - Nate Diaz
2nd Round - Submission - Clay Guida
3rd Round - Submission - Kenny Florian
3 Round - Split Decision - Sergey Golyaev

I will say that some/most of them have been in the last 5 years, but that's no excuse. BJ Penn gets grief on here and on several other media outlets for being "overrated" or "not enough wins" or "lost too many fights to be top 10 all-time" etc. If Penn gets "overrated" claims then Gomi is 100% deserving of them also.

Also, what names has Gomi really beaten?

He has some greats in there like Hayato Sakurai, Jens Pulver - along with some decent ones like Tatsuya Kawajiri and Marcos Aurelio, but overall, there are way more unknowns than there are credible names.

Hold a lot of respect for Gomi, primarily PRIDE Gomi, but is he overrated? At all? Even a little?

35-12...

Thoughts?
 
Neither overrated nor underrated, he is right where he belongs. A great lightweight who for all intents and purposes went against the "grain" of traditional Japanese martial arts (Grappling) and became a feared boxer with some of the fastest hands in lightweight history.
 
Gomi was amazing. Not as amazing as Shane Carwin. He was just past his best when Pride ended.
 
Gomi overrated?
EZOHWJUQ.png


To much time on sherdog and less time watching old fights bro.
 
Glove said:
Neither overrated nor underrated, he is right where he belongs. A great lightweight who for all intents and purposes went against the "grain" of traditional Japanese martial arts (Grappling) and became a feared boxer with some of the fastest hands in lightweight history.
Click to expand...
Gomi was never a great boxer, he was a wrestler first and foremost and developed power in his hands. Power compensates for a lot.
 
Is it me, or is his most famous moment in MMA, him getting Gogoplata'd by a high-as-fuck! Nick Diaz?

Just asking...
 
Gomi was the Shane Carwin of lightweight.
 
Never really cared for his reign in pride because he was beat badly by BJ and BJ always overshadowed him to me.
 
Everyone eventually loses. If you look at every past great, they all have some questionable losses. It happens to them all.
 
I just looked he is 4-10 in the UFC and almost all of his losses were finishes
 
Gomi wasn't overrated. There are times he didn't come in as prepared as he should have or fought stupid because he was cocky, which doesn't do anything to make a loss any less of a loss, but he is legitimately one of the best LWs of all time. Not the best, but somewhere like top 10. He definitely had a weakness in sub defense, but he was one of the best in his prime. He didn't even come to the UFC until he was like 30-31. That's fairly old for a LW. If GSP fought until he was 37, he'd rack up a bunch of losses too. Would it mean he's not the WW GOAT? Nope. We have to look at things in context. It's one of those things where if you look at it now compared to how the scene was at the time, it's really hard to get perspective on it unless you were following the sport then. It's kind of like when Penn beat Hughes and watching it live vs looking back now and going "Meh, what's the big deal".
 
McGangsta said:
Gomi was never a great boxer, he was a wrestler first and foremost and developed power in his hands. Power compensates for a lot.
Click to expand...

Actually he was pretty good boxer and yes he was a shoot wrestler and trained under Noriaki Kiguchi at the Kiguchi dojo, he once had the most feared right hand which produced 6 KO's in two years time. To say he wasn't a good boxer would be incorrect.
 
In his defense, basically every Japanese legend lost their luster once they set foot onto US soil.

The competition here was a rude awakening for them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
1,254,498
Messages
56,650,626
Members
175,334
Latest member
dubhlinn

Share this page

Back
Top