Tom "Big Cat" Erikson was a beast

[Kenny Powerth]

Great video. Terrible song-cover

 

[gosuasus]

Brad Kohler and maybe Phil Baroni. Dave Beneteau? Phil Benedict?

Speaking of the lower weight classes, Miletich was roomates with Kerr, former champ with lineage going all the way to modern ATT basically. Mike van Arsdale is an underrated name, also Iowa state wrestler and an Olympic alternate twice. Matt Lindland, Sean Sherk too, kinda newer generation with Baroni but certainly part of the great wave.

 

[mkt]

Brad Kohler and maybe Phil Baroni. Dave Beneteau? Phil Benedict?

Brad Kohler and maybe Phil Baroni. Dave Beneteau? Phil Benedict?

Beneteau was a judo guy from Canada. Pretty good early fighter, but for some reason a much smaller Oleg Taktarov had his number (submitted him twice in like 1 minute or less).

Are those other guys wrestlers? Just checked Baroni and he was a good juco wrestler until he got expelled from school...kind of foreshadowing troubles later in life. Not sure if the others had strong wrestling credentials.

 

[mkt]

Speaking of the lower weight classes, Miletich was roomates with Kerr, former champ with lineage going all the way to modern ATT basically. Mike van Arsdale is an underrated name, also Iowa state wrestler and an Olympic alternate twice. Matt Lindland, Sean Sherk too, kinda newer generation with Baroni but certainly part of the great wave.

Chael Sonnen's first fight was in 1997...so technically he was a 2nd gen NHB fighter, lol. I know he trained with Tank Abbott at some point. Didn't fight in MMA again until 2002. Maybe he was in college and wrestling during the 5-year layoff?

 

[Flower2dPeople]

Chael Sonnen's first fight was in 1997...so technically he was a 2nd gen NHB fighter, lol. I know he trained with Tank Abbott at some point. Didn't fight in MMA again until 2002. Maybe he was in college and wrestling during the 5-year layoff?

Maybe trying to get into the Olympic team.

 

[RemyR]

Busta like Erickson is unfortunately going to be forgotten as the sport ages.

I try to bring it up every time I see the question asked but IMO Busta is the most underrated fighter of all time, especially considering he was already an older guy when he got into MMA. Also he was robbed in the 2nd Hendo fight, that still drives me crazy to this day

 

[mkt]

Maybe trying to get into the Olympic team.

Yeah. I may make a post about it later...his first fight in a small org was 20 days before UFC 13 when Tito and Randy Couture made their debut. Being an early UFC fan, it's crazy to think his first fight was before those guys. I didn't know about Chael until many years later.

 

[gosuasus]

Chael Sonnen's first fight was in 1997...so technically he was a 2nd gen NHB fighter, lol. I know he trained with Tank Abbott at some point. Didn't fight in MMA again until 2002. Maybe he was in college and wrestling during the 5-year layoff?

Haha, I wasn't aware Sonnen had a fight in the 90s. I think he attended university before starting his MMA career and graduated in sociology or smth like that.

 

[mkt]

Haha, I wasn't aware Sonnen had a fight in the 90s. I think he attended university before starting his MMA career and graduated in sociology or smth like that.

Yeah, he did some small org fight in Washington state (not far from Oregon where he's from). It was probably in his first year or two of college. I guess he focused on wrestling and school until much later.

 

[gosuasus]

I try to bring it up every time I see the question asked but IMO Busta is the most underrated fighter of all time, especially considering he was already an older guy when he got into MMA. Also he was robbed in the 2nd Hendo fight, that still drives me crazy to this day

Love seeing Busta appreciation. I've mentioned his fight with Hendo here as one of the classic robberies and placed him at no.2 MW here. I always lean heavily in his favor because he rarely gets the recognition. We must balance out social discourse so I'm all in on Busta propaganda machine.

 

[mkt]

Love seeing Busta appreciation. I've mentioned his fight with Hendo here as one of the classic robberies and placed him at no.2 MW here. I always lean heavily in his favor because he rarely gets the recognition. We must balance out social discourse so I'm all in on Busta propaganda machine.

One reason Busta gets my respect is he got in the cage/ring with some of the best in the late 90s and early 2000s...unlike some of the Gracies. He faced Liddell, Rampage, Hendo, a huge monster like Erickson, etc.

Meanwhile Royce left the UFC after his first draw and Rickson fought very sub-par competition in Japan (pro wrestlers with no fighting skills, UFC reject Dave Levicki, etc).

And the Gracies were the ones who started out saying they could beat anyone, that size didn't matter and all that.

 

[Flower2dPeople]

Love seeing Busta appreciation. I've mentioned his fight with Hendo here as one of the classic robberies and placed him at no.2 MW here. I always lean heavily in his favor because he rarely gets the recognition. We must balance out social discourse so I'm all in on Busta propaganda machine.

Busta will never be forgotten. His legacy will always remind us of him.

 

[TR1]

Wasn't he mostly coaching by the time he fought guys like Herring?

His KO over Randleman was disgusting.
(RIP Kevin).

 

[mkt]

Wasn't he mostly coaching by the time he fought guys like Herring?

His KO over Randleman was disgusting.
(RIP Kevin).

Yeah, Erickon was doing some wrestling coaching at the college level and I think one school told me he couldn't do MMA, which was still controversial at the time. It was all for the best, as Tom was 44 in his last fight.

 

[TRYHARD 2001]

His run in K-1 made no real sense to me on any level but you gotta get paid, I guess. Wish he had more opportunities in Pride, cuz his fights were usually awesome. An absolute bear of a man that had a natural ability to blend the striking in seamlessly with his wrestling.

+1 for nostalgia.

 

[TeenageMutantLesnarTurtle]

He was a very scary dude. Big, strong as a bull, could move for his size, obviously great wrestling and although his striking was pretty rudimentary he could really crack. His main issue was his sub game wasnt all that developed.

Put 90s Tom against guys like Lewis, Gane, Volkov, Waldo and Tai and he is absolutely winning more than hes losing.

 

[stronghulk]

Nothing beats the Ironlife days, even I made a few highlight video.
I actually made one for Eddie Bravo at his request like 20 years ago, (actually maybe more)

I still wonder what KickYourHeadOff is up to these days.

And is Dribbles gonna finally be President?

(Anyone that knows who I'm talking about gets a prize)

KYHO, Hero1 and the old sherdog highlights.. Those were the days. I was very active on ironlife, also on the kakoutogi (spelling?) forums. Dribbles very much rings a bell, but this was like 20-25 years ago? Time flies.

 

[TheBulge]

His run in K-1 made no real sense to me on any level but you gotta get paid, I guess. Wish he had more opportunities in Pride, cuz his fights were usually awesome. An absolute bear of a man that had a natural ability to blend the striking in seamlessly with his wrestling.

+1 for nostalgia.

If you thought that was bad, you should probably avoid checking out his run in K-1 where I think he was even older.

He embarrassed himself several times, like against Nortje and also getting ko'd by Shannon Briggs which made boxing fans think their fighters stood a chance against K-1/MMA.

By that time people forgot he was a lethal early MMA specimen. 6'4 270+ with elite wrestling and bricks for fists.

 

[Bullitt68]

Those early Dailymotion style highlight reels hit different. The MMA "Dream On" tribute and the "Ken Wayne Shamrock" tribute are also amazing.

War Big Cat! Definitely someone who was fighting for the fun of it... not to make money or build a "brand"

Old school HL vids are like endangered species. I've lost track of some old Cro Cop ones that I wish I could find again. This Sean Sherk one always hits that OG spot, though:



And yes, those two you mentioned are also awesome.

 

[FreddieRoachsVoice]

Old school HL vids are like endangered species. I've lost track of some old Cro Cop ones that I wish I could find again. This Sean Sherk one always hits that OG spot, though:



And yes, those two you mentioned are also awesome.

Sherk is one of my all time favs and yet I haven't seen this in a good while. Thanks for uploading! These should be pinned somewhere; sad to think most modern fans probably haven't seen the Dream On one which is like a history of the sport