"The MMA from today is a completely different sport than...

.. the MMA from 10 years ago!"

Would you go that far ? Yeah, it's different, but I've seen people saying those things and I find a overreaction.

There are a higher number of high level guys today, many more fighters into the sport, I see that as the main difference. From quantity you take more quality.

 

It's different. And better in every conceivable way.

 

I would say it's in the middle, some aspects have changed but we still see the occasional brawler and there's still some veterans that have yet to retire.

I would say in 5-10 more years we'll see more athletes coming into MMA and dominating, that's been the key difference so far and it's only going to expand further as the sport ages and more kids transition into the sport.

 

MMA sucks. Bring back Vale Tudo

 

Vale Tudo is to Combat Sports as Backyard Wrasslin is to Wrasslin

 

its evolving

 

it is a completely different sport even compared to 5 years ago.
not only because the fighters are fitter and more skilled but because the sport is being "figured out", you see a lot of guys doing the same techniques that were used successfully before by other fighters, thanks to a curriculum of techniques that now we know are useful in an mma fight.

for example you can see that every Team Alpha Male fighter has a wrestling background but can take the back from scrambles and guillotine the opponent even better than world class jiu jitsu black belts.
this is because usefull techniques are selected and drilled over and over and done perfectly till mastered.

i remember i read a Jon Fitch interview and he said when he started guys were trying to figure out what to do, how to train, guys went to the gym saying "what we do today? maybe we should do this we should do that".
it isn't like that anymore, now every top gym is like a factory that takes raw materials (talented aspiring fighters) and make finished polished products.

 

It's a whole new world.

 

Meh. More fighters are well rounded.

 

Exactly this.

I was watching Sakuraba/Vernon White the other day and it made me think about how much the metagame has changed. White knew Sak wanted to get it to the ground and came in planning to sprawl on his takedowns, which he did, but Sakuraba would just chain another shot and get an easy takedown. Now guys are starting to realize that the sprawl position (not front headlock) isn't a great position to be in against a guy that wants to take you down and there's a lot more focus on killing shots before they happen via distance control and killing the positioning on shots by angling out instead of staying square to the opponent.

That's one small example, but this kinda thing is happening in every small area of MMA. People are figuring out how to more effectively integrate hand fighting, elbows, head position in the clinch, even eye pokes.

 

The moves are the same. Training is getting much smarter though.

 

Ding Ding! We got a winner! I think a lot of fighters are well rounded to a fault, you know to a point when they don't really excel at anything.

 

Hendo has been doing the same shit for like 20 years

 

No it isn't, not even close...No tournaments anymore, You still can't even throw a basic grounded knee attack in the UFC..more hype and bullshit..ugh

 

First of all, I reject that having defined tournament brackets improves on the sport. However, if it does, the UFC is actually doing more tournaments now than it was in 2005.

In the last 2 years, the UFC has crowned two champions with tournaments. (Demetrious Johnson and Carla Esparza.) You have to go back to UFC 41 in 2003 to find the last UFC tournament before these.

Not to mention, there are more seasons of TUF than ever, which are tournaments, and are consistently producing great fighters, ie: Ferguson, Dillashaw, Gastelum etc.


You also couldn't knee the head of a grounded opponent in 2005. I didn't say the sport was perfect now, I'm just saying, virtually all of the changes have been for the better for the UFC itself, the fans, and the fighters.

 

PRIDE FC. The sport was better when PRIDE was at its peak..around 2005, ten years ago. We may have different tastes as fans, that was my flavour.

 

I'm with you.

TUF Tournaments have nothing on the Pride GP's.

It's sad, it's like he forgot Pride even existed...

There wasn't nearly as many questionable decisions 10 years ago either

 

Not really if you look how sports like football evoled over the years. MMA is not evolving that much as many people want to believe.

 

+1 for me

 

no.