Would Ngannous run with limited grappling and mainly punching work in the old UFC?

The Franc that lost to Stipe? No. The Franc that figured Stipe out and brutalized him? Yea, that guy beats a lot of the earlier champs no problem imo.
Those are the same Francs. Most of the difference was Stipe falling off an age/injury cliff. Stipe was old for the first Cormier fight and was roadkill by the end of the Cormier trilogy.

In particular, the Ngannou who lost to Stipe and the Ngannou who struggled with Gane were very much the same fighter, a counterstriker who didn't have much on the feet for a technically sound striker with solid defense and who had C- wrestling, the difference being that Gane had less than no wrestling or ground game.
 
Randy is smaller.
Randy held his own in the wrestling department vs Brock, a former NCAA champ who is arguably the biggest HW to have evercompeted in the UFC in the modern era. That doesn’t mean Randy would easily get Francis down, but he absolutely is capable of it. I’m not saying I think Randy wins the fight, but it’d be a great style matchup, assuming Randy at his best
 
You think he beats prime Cain, Brock, DC, Mir, Carwin, and Barnett? I don’t think he wins those 6 in a row… he’d have a punchers chance in all of them. The DC that destroyed Barnett and Rampage has a 95% chance of winning in my eyes.

If OP only means like Bas Rutten and Randleman era… Francis likely wins all his fights… Bob Sapp won fights back then….
He absolutely destroys Mir, Carwin and Brock.
 
Frank Mir would be capable of pulling off a submission.
How? What's he doing jumping guard to get the fight down, because that's his only chance and we all know he folds like a cheap lawn chair if hit with big shots
 
The Franc that lost to Stipe? No. The Franc that figured Stipe out and brutalized him? Yea, that guy beats a lot of the earlier champs no problem imo.

Assuming this a prime vs prime discussion:

I think Barnett, Mir, Werdum, and Nog may have presented some problems and may have been able to catch Franc in something. Franc never faced any grapplers with a submission game like those dudes.

Randy was mentioned, and I don’t think it’s impossible for Randy to pull off a workmanlike victory, but then again, Franc is going to be harder to grind on for 5 rounds than someone like Tim.

Wouldn’t pick Brock.

I’m still picking prime Cain and JDS confidently. I’d also pick the best version of DC.

Kettlebell Fedor demolishes him.
Yes, I'd pick Barnett and Big Nog out of them...

Barnett's crafty af with a great chin. Nog mightve been able to use his jits to exhaust Francis but...

If Fedor bounced Nog's head on the canvas like a basketball, imagine what Francis could do...
 
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Yes, I'd pick Barnett and Big Nog out of them...

Barnett's crafty af with a great chin. Nog mightve been able to use his jits to exhaust Francis but...

If Fedor bounced Nog's head on the canvas like a basketball, imagine what Francis could do...

No doubt. Fedor was able to do that bc he had a good base. Sambo and kettlebells in the snow baby. Franc has murderous follow up gnp, though I’m not sure how he’d do in the guard of a highly skilled grappler like Nog.
 
Those are the same Francs. Most of the difference was Stipe falling off an age/injury cliff. Stipe was old for the first Cormier fight and was roadkill by the end of the Cormier trilogy.

In particular, the Ngannou who lost to Stipe and the Ngannou who struggled with Gane were very much the same fighter, a counterstriker who didn't have much on the feet for a technically sound striker with solid defense and who had C- wrestling, the difference being that Gane had less than no wrestling or ground game.

As a huge Stipe advocate, I like this take. Stipe did sustain a lot of damage in those Cormier fights, despite winning. If he was on the edge of his prime, that trilogy put him
over the edge. People like to diminish Stipe’s dominance over Cormier by saying the Cormier was past prime, but so was Stipe.

A parallel can be drawn here to the Anderson/ Weidman fights. Sometimes, a single KO can usher the downfall of a dominant fighter. Anderson was still very good when My Boy KO’d him, but he was never the same after that.
 
The version of Francis who beat Stipe beats the living sh** outta any HW not named Cain, DC and Jones in their primes.
 
How? What's he doing jumping guard to get the fight down, because that's his only chance and we all know he folds like a cheap lawn chair if hit with big shots
Getting rocked and when Francis goes for the kill he subs him.
He's done it vs much better grapplers than Francis(Nog)
 
The version of Francis who beat Stipe beats the living sh** outta any HW not named Cain, DC and Jones in their primes.

There are guys that would give him problems and could beat him. Barnett, Fedor, Aleks, Werdum, Nogueira, Lesnar to name a few. They would all give him problems in different ways, mostly with the grappling. Someone like Aleks would be a very tough fight standing with his speed and power in his boxing game.
 
Nobody cannot be beat Ngannou.
Ngannou will kill everyone.
Ngannou will knock out an elephant.

oh my, wait a second!


anyone can be beat.

Im curious since grapplers filled up the sport much more in the early days, would Ngannou get stopped sooner and more often back when wrestlers and jujitsu players dominated?

Or is this an invalid question since most fighters werent his size and skilled back then?
What do you guys think?
 
Im curious since grapplers filled up the sport much more in the early days, would Ngannou get stopped sooner and more often back when wrestlers and jujitsu players dominated?

Or is this an invalid question since most fighters werent his size and skilled back then?
What do you guys think?
Not even Mike Tyson would have a very good run if he ran into good grapplers he himself admitted that so Ngannou wouldn’t fare to well if he were in early UFC for one it took him awhile to get the striking ability he has now and he’d be open for takedowns with those wide outstretch swings .
 
Not even Mike Tyson would have a very good run if he ran into good grapplers he himself admitted that so Ngannou wouldn’t fare to well if he were in early UFC for one it took him awhile to get the striking ability he has now and he’d be open for takedowns with those wide outstretch swings .
Ngannou is much better in freestyle than Tyson. Tyson was weak in the clinch
 
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