MMA has basically stopped evolving in the last 10 years

[jx820]

Cain was exceptional in his day, but there are a few HW I can see being major problems for him.
Prime Weidman isn't a lock to hold a belt in today's MW division. There are several guys in the last year or two that I might pick against him. Izzy, Poatan, DDP, Whitaker, Chimaev, and Cannonier would not be freebies for him.
Islam would tie Bendo in knots

Jon, GSP, and MM were goats in their respective divisions. That doesn't mean the sport hasn't progressed, just that we had 3 pretty special athletes at the time. One of whom we still have.

 

[markys00]

GSP got beat by Hendricks, who got beat by Lawler. GSP would not be champion today, probably not even in the top 5 WW. Takedown defense alone, is worlds apart from where it was 10 years ago, everybody just got better, and more well rounded. There isnt a champion from 10 years ago that would be champion now other than JJ, and that’s because he evolved with the sport.

Lol ur dumb

 

[Woody869]

You still can’t say that he was scared for his legacy to fight Woodley because he was set to fight him. The bout was pulled by Dana at the press conference after Woodleys fight with Maia due to Woodleys lack luster performance, at least in his eyes.

BS, YOU'RE WRONG. If your logic was correct, why wouldn't Dana didn't want GSP to be a champion again, and not the boring champion Woodley???

Besides, GPS didn't want to hurt his legacy. It wasn't worth the risk.

 

[Woody869]

My point was that if you wanna make the MMamath argument and say that the guy who beat the guy who beat GSP (even though he didn’t actually beat GSP, you just think the judges got it wrong) must then also be better than GSP then that argument has to cut both ways. So I can then point out that GSP beat guys who beat the guys who went on to be champion. If you then want to argue that these fights occured at different times under different contexts and that this doesn’t necessarily mean anything then that applies to your original argument also.

So your argument either eats itself or it becomes a wash. Either way, it’s a bad argument.

I'm not using MMA math in my logic. I'm saying the younger fighters like Hendricks, Lawler, and Woodley were catching up to him. After a reign like GSP had, people watch the tape, practice how to counter what GSP does best, so if you can neutralize his best offense, or defense you can beat him. Hendricks proved this.
GSP knew he lost that fight, that's why he made a rash decision, and didn't know when he'd come back. Bottom line, we wouldn't look at GSP as the GOAT had he kept fighting. Because he would of ended with 2-3 more losses.

 

[Woody869]

Dude chill with that shit. The current WW champion almost lost to Nate Diaz.

The previous WW champ was defending his belt against LWs from GSP's era.... A lot of his best wins are LWs from GSP's era....

The sport's evolution is highly overrated. On average, it's better. The elite of 2010 aren't getting wiped out by today's WWs/MWs/LHWs/HWs....

Leon dominated that fight from the opening round until nate landed one punch. That can happen to anyone.

 

[chinarice]

Leon dominated that fight from the opening round until nate landed one punch. That can happen to anyone.

Colby Covington is the #1 contender and lost to world beater Warley Alves.

Woodley KTFO'ed Lawler who beat Hendricks, who lost to Lawler who lost to RDA who was a LW during GSP's era.

Burns? Stephen Thompson? These guys are too good for GSP? Really? Leon had issues stopping Usman's takedowns, whose aren't as good as GSP's.

There is no WW that has come about that GSP couldn't beat when he was in his prime. I honestly think Khamzat would have been his toughest fight.

 

[HavokHarmon]

BS, YOU'RE WRONG. If your logic was correct, why wouldn't Dana didn't want GSP to be a champion again, and not the boring champion Woodley???

Besides, GPS didn't want to hurt his legacy. It wasn't worth the risk.

What I described literally happened at the post fight presser; Dana announced that GSP would be facing Bisping instead of Woodley because he didn’t feel Tyron deserved it after his last performance.

 

[HavokHarmon]

I'm not using MMA math in my logic. I'm saying the younger fighters like Hendricks, Lawler, and Woodley were catching up to him. After a reign like GSP had, people watch the tape, practice how to counter what GSP does best, so if you can neutralize his best offense, or defense you can beat him. Hendricks proved this.
GSP knew he lost that fight, that's why he made a rash decision, and didn't know when he'd come back. Bottom line, we wouldn't look at GSP as the GOAT had he kept fighting. Because he would have ended with 2-3 more losses.

You were when you said that that Lawler beat Hendricks who beat GSP, therefore GSP knew that he would have lost.

You keep making claims regarding GsPs motivation that you can’t possibly know. “GSP did X because of Y” is fine to think but recognize that it’s based on pure speculation on your part. And in some cases where there’s actually some evidence to the contrary you just choose to disregard it entirely.

Bottom line in my opinion, it seems you wouldn’t look at GSP as the goat whether he had kept fighting or not because if he had won his next 2-3 fights and retired you could still field basically the same argument; he retired because he knew he would lose. Something you can’t actually prove because regardless of when his retirement took place you can’t run a counterfactual on it.

 

[Woody869]

Colby Covington is the #1 contender and lost to world beater Warley Alves.

Woodley KTFO'ed Lawler who beat Hendricks, who lost to Lawler who lost to RDA who was a LW during GSP's era.

Burns? Stephen Thompson? These guys are too good for GSP? Really? Leon had issues stopping Usman's takedowns, whose aren't as good as GSP's.

There is no WW that has come about that GSP couldn't beat when he was in his prime. I honestly think Khamzat would have been his toughest fight.

GSP nutsniffers . He was a top ten fighter of all time, no doubt, BUT, He lost in his prime. Here's a list of fighters who didn't.
Fedor
Jones
Khabib
Aldo
Usman

He quit fighting at 32 except for a MW fight against an overrated champion Bisping. He QUIT after a fight he was gifted against Hendricks He got his ass beat in that fight. Had he lost against, Lawler, or Woodley, or Hendricks he would not had been considered the GOAT by some.

 

[Ogata]

I think the problem lies in economy and culture. The economy changed, people have to work like 2 or 3 jobs just to get by. They do not have the time to be martial arts connoisseurs and study the various arts in great details and combine them with various arts to create a hybrid styles unique to that individual fighter.

Modern times= Tons of cookie cutter trainers who have shallow understanding of martial arts + fitness culture bleeding in to the gyms so they can make money to pay the rent that is much more expensive now a days. MMA fighters today are just chasing clout, I cannot blame them, no point being a UFC fighter. Over the years we have had so many UFC fighters that it has lots its charm.


90s era= A martial artist was a MASTER of his craft, studied its techniques and came up with variations. These guys also worked as bouncers, bodyguards and military personals that allowed them to use some of their skills. They also were not social media goofballs and kept it real. May not have been skilled in MMA strategies but they had raw aggression and being a UFC fighter was a rare honor!

 

[weed]

I feel like fighters are more concerned with developing fame and media presence than skill these days.
Sadly it’s because it is what is rewarded by the company.

yup.. funny seeing this thread now. I just posted this minutes ago in another:

BJ's story & downfall is sad as all hell, because of where he once stood in this here MMA. that was a special time when we used to hunger for events. not to say there's too much going on at present, but it feels like the sport has lost the 'warrior spirit' or soul whateverthefuck that MMArtists like BJ exemplified at the time. the belts seemingly have lost a lot of value - the incentive is income in a lot of ways. vanity, that challenges the very core tenet of TMA (safe Muay Thai, Lethwei, etc.) being discipline.

 

[Jawth]

GSP got beat by Hendricks, who got beat by Lawler. GSP would not be champion today, probably not even in the top 5 WW. Takedown defense alone, is worlds apart from where it was 10 years ago, everybody just got better, and more well rounded. There isnt a champion from 10 years ago that would be champion now other than JJ, and that’s because he evolved with the sport.

Prime Mighty Mouse would run throught the whole flyweight division.

 

[Neck&Neck]

The Newer Breed is coming
this is just a blip on the radar

 

[JoeRowe]

I honestly don’t think most of you even know what the conversation is actually about. Let alone having any decent take on it. If you think the sport has “evolved” you’re not intelligent. There is nothing done today that hasn’t been done for at least 20 years.

It’s that the hoi polloi (the masses) are more rounded in general today. That is not evolution. That is the LCD upping their game a little bit compared to the elite. Again.. Not evolution.

Name anything everybody does today that the elite weren’t doing back in the day. There are NONE.

Today's boxing in mma is immeasurably better. Guys didn't even know how to use any sort of jab 10 or 15 years ago. It was all overhands into doublelegs. Triangle chokes used to work regularly before defense evolved. The calf kick, the Khabib leg-wrapping, & weaponizing pace are all much more prevalent as well.

 

[panamaican]

Total bullshit what your saying here the fact is that UFC is an entertainment company first not a sport like so many want to believe which is why all I ever from the casuals and noobs is how much they detest grappling and its boring etc, the UFC knows that KO's bring in more viewers this is the true reason and nothing will convince otherwise and saying its the evolution is so utterly stupid I don't even know where to begin, yes sloppy brawls are the evolution and take more skill than high level wrestling or BJJ lol how ridiculous.

As long as the fighter has enough td defense just like Gane who was subbed in like a minute ya that's the evolution of the sport right there being a one dimentional striker what a joke. Also the whole KO thing and strikes is much easier is so out of touch with reality because pro boxers can't even score KO's when they want and many times boxing matches go the distance its just in the UFC the competitors have this pressure that if they're not entertaining that they will be sidelined so they engage in these
brawls that the fans like, that's why it seems that it is more effective because 2 guys are consciously choosing to abandon going to the ground in favor of brawling.

That's a lot of angry to posting to miss my point, lol.

If you want to argue it, answer something for me first: Is it easier to knock someone out with an overhand right or check hook while they come in or is it easier to get a takedown, work for control and then sink in a fight finishing submission?

 

[nostradumbass]

GSP got beat by Hendricks, who got beat by Lawler. GSP would not be champion today, probably not even in the top 5 WW. Takedown defense alone, is worlds apart from where it was 10 years ago, everybody just got better, and more well rounded. There isnt a champion from 10 years ago that would be champion now other than JJ, and that’s because he evolved with the sport.

Not sure Jones really evolved with the sport because there wasn't much evolution he had to keep up with. The main thing he changed was he started playing it way safer after Gus beat him up. Before that, he was fighting often and was way more creative and threw a bunch of spinning shit and different trips and throws and had more aggressive grappling, and then only fought 10 times in 10 years and only finished 3 of them.

GSP did the same thing and fought way safer after the Serra fight.

The biggest addition in MMA has been the calf kicks, and submissions are less common now, but the last 10 years obviously hasn't seen the huge improvements of the previous 10 years.

 

[moreorless87]

I'm not using MMA math in my logic. I'm saying the younger fighters like Hendricks, Lawler, and Woodley were catching up to him. After a reign like GSP had, people watch the tape, practice how to counter what GSP does best, so if you can neutralize his best offense, or defense you can beat him. Hendricks proved this.
GSP knew he lost that fight, that's why he made a rash decision, and didn't know when he'd come back. Bottom line, we wouldn't look at GSP as the GOAT had he kept fighting. Because he would of ended with 2-3 more losses.

I think you could argue GSP's ACL injury was potentially a factor along with just having a lot of milage by that point dispite being relatively young. That said I would personally say the peak of WW probably ended up being the years just after he dropped the belt, the same way I think the peak of MW ended up being the few years after Anderson lost the belt.

 

[Rationality]

Not this again. ....

 

[jackleeb]

wrong. we have seen multiple high-level fights in the past decade (especially in the past couple years) that debunked long-standing myths and "what-ifs".

right now, the best MMA fighters in the world are:
- Jon Jones / Tom Aspinall / Francis Ngannou
- Alex Pereira / Islam Makhachev


what did it take to get to this high-level list?

- jon jones vs ciryl gane:
proved that no matter how good you are at striking or stand-up, wrestling and grappling are at least 50% of MMA

- francis ngannou vs ciryl fane:
proved that without high-level jiu jitsu knowledge, you will just flounder around on the ground with a position you were winning in

- tom aspinall vs sergey pavlovich:
proved that no matter how hard you hit or your KO power/frequency, movement and agility is important even at heavyweight

- alex pereira vs jiri prochazka:
proved that fundamental striking and timing is way more lethal than wild, blitzing style. also calf kicks are overpowered for
disabling movement in your opponent and paying dividends for the later rounds

- sean strickland vs israel adesenya:
proved that the best striking offense is striking defense. enough said

- islam makhachev vs volkanovski 1, first fight:
proved that proper takedown defense and submission defense can counter even the best submission grapplers

- islam makhachev vs volkanoski 2, second fight:
proved how effective headkicks are (and kicks in general for adding variety and unpredictability)

- islam makhachev vs charles oliveira:
proved that flying knees are more flashy than substance. only works with the right timing (like alex pereira). doing it at the wrong time is just terrible and leaves you open for counter hooks (like prochazka vs glover). also proved that it is possible to submit even the best grapplers if you have top position

- khabib vs all his opponents:
proved how effective MMA grappling is. just the threat of takedown makes opponents hesitant and not fight normal (justin gaethje said this about his fight against Khabib)

- henry cejudo vs aljamain sterling:
proved that being olympic wrestling gold medalist doesn't mean you are MMA world champion.
wrestling is only part of MMA, not all of it. also height matters. if you are way shorter than your opponent, it won't matter how good your skills are because closing the distance (the "void" as demetrius johnson calls it), will prove to be difficult. your opponent can just jab or leg chop their way to a point decision (like we saw tyson fury did against francis)

 

[Woody869]

Prime Mighty Mouse would run throught the whole flyweight division.

I think MM right now may run through the division still because he's evolved with the sport. He is the flyweight GOAT. He still may be, but I think 5 years ago version would probably get beat by the division leaders.
MM might be the one fighter of even think could.