UFC 203: Because CM Punk is finally fighting

[SteveJRogers]

 

 

(Daniel Bryan Says He Could Beat Mike Jackson On the Ground in UFC Fight)

 

Even if that's true, he's a goddamned fool for even thinking it. Hello, did he suddenly forget about his brain and concussion issues?

You take stuff too seriously sometimes man

I agree. That was akin to say a Hank Aaron saying hed probably hit well against Clayton Kershaw.

 

Clearly meaning healthy and in the prime of his career, all thongs being equal.

[Slasher]

 

 

 

(Daniel Bryan Says He Could Beat Mike Jackson On the Ground in UFC Fight)

 

Even if that's true, he's a goddamned fool for even thinking it. Hello, did he suddenly forget about his brain and concussion issues?

You take stuff too seriously sometimes man

I agree. That was akin to say a Hank Aaron saying hed probably hit well against Clayton Kershaw.

 

Clearly meaning healthy and in the prime of his career, all thongs being equal.

Even with that considered, it isn't likely to be true still. Bryan went into pro wrestling extremely young and so that is all he knows. There is a big difference in looking good grappling with opponents who you expect to cooperate with you and grappling with opponents who would legitimately fight for every inch in grapples. Unless DB has some extensive background in any martial arts discipline (that I am unaware of), he won't stack up well against any MMA fighter with an ounce of experience. But clearly he's entitled to his opinion, but it is fair to disagree with that notion.

[Victator]

I don't think Jackson looked good at all. The fight looked like the worst of ancient mma and modern mma at the same time.

WWE should go for the deep cut and bring in 80s jobber Mike Jackson to get the win.

 

Did somebody ask about better wrestlers than Punk.

[SirEdger]

 

 

 

(Daniel Bryan Says He Could Beat Mike Jackson On the Ground in UFC Fight)

 

Even if that's true, he's a goddamned fool for even thinking it. Hello, did he suddenly forget about his brain and concussion issues?

You take stuff too seriously sometimes man

I agree. That was akin to say a Hank Aaron saying hed probably hit well against Clayton Kershaw.

 

Clearly meaning healthy and in the prime of his career, all thongs being equal.

Even with that considered, it isn't likely to be true still. Bryan went into pro wrestling extremely young and so that is all he knows. There is a big difference in looking good grappling with opponents who you expect to cooperate with you and grappling with opponents who would legitimately fight for every inch in grapples. Unless DB has some extensive background in any martial arts discipline (that I am unaware of), he won't stack up well against any MMA fighter with an ounce of experience. But clearly he's entitled to his opinion, but it is fair to disagree with that notion.

 

 

I believe Bryan is a blue belt in BJJ but I could be wrong.

[Jetlag]

CM Punk is also a blue belt, supposedly...

[NotJayTabb]

 

 

Yeah, we are sure there's anything to this Cabana issue? According to the reports, they were friendly in court.

Punk himself referred to Cabana as his best friend in a couple of interviews after the case was over. The report about them having a "falling out" was almost two years ago though, I guess they could've patched things up a while ago. Now, the original rumor said it was because Cabana went backstage to a RAW show and took pictures with people. If Bix says that didn't happen, I wonder if they ever had a falling out in the first place.

These quotes from a post-trial interview with Colt don't suggest things are going too well...

 

On the status of his friendship with Punk: We're... we're what we are, you know?

 

On whether he and Punk are least cordial: Yes. Of course we are.

 

https://411mania.com/wrestling/colt-cabana-discusses-status-friendship-cm-punk/

[Mad Dog]

I don't think Jackson looked good at all. The fight looked like the worst of ancient mma and modern mma at the same time.

 

WWE should go for the deep cut and bring in 80s jobber Mike Jackson to get the win.

 

Did somebody ask about better wrestlers than Punk.

Kimbo Slice vs. Dada 5000 was worse honestly. That fight made MMA look like a total joke and Dada almost died and they were extremely negligent in letting Kimbo fight with his health issues.

[Log]

CM Punk is also a blue belt, supposedly...

And Elvis was a black belt in Karate.

[GOTNW]

Punk might be a legit blue belt in kimono grappling for all we know, but that's a totally different experience than grappling in shorts, which again is different than grappling with gloves and with striking allowed.

[Cap]

I don't know what Punk's credentials are, but he looked absolutely lost out there. I have been more or less done with the UFC (and MMA pretty broadly) for a couple years now (if I want pro wrestling booking I'll watch pro wrestling - and I do), but I didn't really begrudge them booking Punk once as a draw to see what - if anything - he had. Booking him the second time was a terrible look. It was genuinely embarrassing and I don't mean that as an aspersion on him. He isn't responsible for the sport. He is only responsible for himself and he made a choice as an adult that he wanted to give this a go. The biggest promotion on earth and an athletic commission gave him the green light. The UFC shouldn't have booked it and if they took themselves seriously as a sports promotion, they wouldn't. The athletic commission shouldn't have allowed it and if they took their jobs seriously, they wouldn't.

 

I like MMA, but this kind of stuff just isn't interesting to me.

[supremebve]

Del Rio is former world-class amateur wrestler with MMA experience. He may not be an elite fighter, but he's not just some guy off the street either. He also outweighs McGregor by nearly 100 pounds. I have no idea who would win in a fight between the two, but I can guarantee McGregor wouldn't get a first-round knockout. He has yet to show he can knock out a welterweight, let alone a heavyweight.

Have you watched Del Rio fight? I have, and he's not good at it. McGregor is a top 5 pound for pound fighter in the world, and is better at every aspect of MMA than Del Rio. He hasn't knocked out a welterweight, but the only one he has fought is Nate Diaz, who has on of the best chins in the history of the sport. McGregor puts him out of his misery in the first round every single time, his skill level is far too high for someone like Del Rio to actually compete with him despite the size difference. The size difference is also much smaller than you think. McGregor probably walks into the cage around 170-175 lbs. and there is no way that Del Rio is anywhere close to being in fight shape at 240 lbs. (his Sherdog profile is 210 lbs.). His last fight was a knockout loss to some dude named Yamamoto Hanshi, who has exactly one knockout win in his illustrious 5-6 record...it was Alberto Del Rio. Del Rio is an actively bad MMA fighter, he will not be able to compete with one of the 5 best fighters on the planet. He will be knocked unconscious.

 

Do you think Mason Plumlee can compete with LeBron James at basketball? He's a professional basketball player, Plumlee is bigger, he was an All-American in college, and is currently in the NBA. He's much closer to LeBron James than Alberto Del Rio is to Conor McGregor. He should at least take a few games of one-on-one right? This is the argument you are trying to make. You are telling me that Mason Plumlee wouldn't be ran off of the court by LeBron James.

[NintendoLogic]

OK, this is getting silly. If you can imagine a fantasy scenario where McGregor puts on 20 pounds and gains enough striking power to knock out heavyweights without his conditioning taking a serious hit, I can just as easily imagine Alberto training for the fight like it's a full-time job and hiring someone like Greg Jackson to devise the perfect game plan. Remember that he was a full-time professional wrestler when he fought and MMA was basically a side gig. He wore a mask during his fights, for chrissakes.

 

Do you think Mason Plumlee can compete with LeBron James at basketball? He's a professional basketball player, Plumlee is bigger, he was an All-American in college, and is currently in the NBA. He's much closer to LeBron James than Alberto Del Rio is to Conor McGregor. He should at least take a few games of one-on-one right? This is the argument you are trying to make. You are telling me that Mason Plumlee wouldn't be ran off of the court by LeBron James.

 

Basketball is not a combat sport. And for the record, LeBron actually outweighs Plumlee.

[SPS]

McGregor wouldn't need to KO Alberto, he could leg kick the hell out of him and I doubt Alberto could stop them without opening himself up to more kicks to the body or head.

[supremebve]

OK, this is getting silly. If you can imagine a fantasy scenario where McGregor puts on 20 pounds and gains enough striking power to knock out heavyweights without his conditioning taking a serious hit, I can just as easily imagine Alberto training for the fight like it's a full-time job and hiring someone like Greg Jackson to devise the perfect game plan. Remember that he was a full-time professional wrestler when he fought and MMA was basically a side gig. He wore a mask during his fights, for chrissakes.

 

Do you think Mason Plumlee can compete with LeBron James at basketball? He's a professional basketball player, Plumlee is bigger, he was an All-American in college, and is currently in the NBA. He's much closer to LeBron James than Alberto Del Rio is to Conor McGregor. He should at least take a few games of one-on-one right? This is the argument you are trying to make. You are telling me that Mason Plumlee wouldn't be ran off of the court by LeBron James.

 

Basketball is not a combat sport. And for the record, LeBron actually outweighs Plumlee.

I don't think McGregor has to add a pound to his body to knock out Alberto Del Rio no matter how much time Del Rio trains. Del Rio fought Hiroyuki Ito, who is 170 lbs. with a 5-11 record and lost. Del Rio does not have the athleticism, skill, or talent to compete with a fighter the caliber of Conor McGregor. One of them is an elite, world class talent, the other is a professional wrestler who last got knocked out by a dude who I couldn't find a picture of on the internet(none of his last 7 opponents have enough of a profile to have a picture or their heights and weights on Sherdog.com). Basketball is not a combat sport, but no one believes that someone like Plumlee could compete with the best players in the NBA, despite them being in the best league on the planet. Somehow, you believe that someone like Alberto Del Rio, who has never shown the ability to fight at a UFC level, can compete with one of the best fighters on the planet. He can't. He's legitimately bad at MMA. His best win was against Brad Kohler (12-15), and it's because Kohler got injured (Kohler was in the middle of a 11 fight losing streak). You want to know why he wore the mask? Because it is the only reason any of these places were willing to pay him to fight.

 

For what it's worth, he was fighting the kind of competition that CM Punk should have been fighting. He did have that fight against Cro Cop, which was ill advised and went the distance with Kazuhiro Nakamura (185 lbs.), which is admirable...but I think he only fought one other person with a winning record.

[Log]

Ok! Now lets do Superman vs. The Hulk!

[clintthecrippler]

The really sad part is that CM Punk probably doesn't even realize that his health, safety, and well-being was as exploited by Dana White and Duke Roufus as it ever was by Vince McMahon and WWE.

[supremebve]

The really sad part is that CM Punk probably doesn't even realize that his health, safety, and well-being was as exploited by Dana White and Duke Roufus as it ever was by Vince McMahon and WWE.

Probably worse. For as bad as wrestling is for you, most wrestlers don't end up with pugilistic dementia. I remember when I was a kid, me and my cousin wanted to take up boxing, so we asked my uncle to take us to train and he looked at us and said, "no, everyone who boxes ends up with slurred speech." Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair were just on the Dan LeBatard show and even though both of their bodies are broken they are still cutting promos like its 1985.

[SPS]

Plenty of wrestlers ended up being pretty punchy as well in later years just that with wrestling especially before the era of shoot interviews you didn't see them speak as much publicly in their later years.

 

Also lots of older famous boxers have no slurred speech or are punchy like George Foreman,Evander Holyfield,Ray Leonard even old timers like Willie Pep had no slurred speech.

 

It really comes down to the person as genetics and lifestyle would play as big a factor as damage.

[Bix]

Oh. https://deadspin.com/court-records-wwe-doctor-who-sued-cm-punk-had-sexual-r-1826818551

[fxnj]

Let's not kid ourselves here. Tons of wrestlers have been shown to have had CTE, even guys who didn't wrestle anything resembling a dangerous or hard-hitting style. I'd argue UFC seems pretty caring about keeping Punk safe with how White blasted Jackson for prolonging the beating rather than trying to finish the fight early.

[KawadaSmile]

Kimbo Slice vs. Dada 5000 was worse honestly. That fight made MMA look like a total joke and Dada almost died and they were extremely negligent in letting Kimbo fight with his health issues.

 

Are you kidding? Kimbo Slice vs Dada 5000 was amazing, although I'm not sure if that match didn't make his condition worse, which in turn led to his demise.

 

So yeah.

 

Also this fucking event had 150k ppv buys so the ones making MMA a joke aren't really Phil or Jackson more than Dana if he's booking that sort of shit.

[Mad Dog]

I'm pretty sure Kimbo was pretty much dead by the time that fight happened. I would have to go look but his medicals were brutal.

[Robert S]

 

The really sad part is that CM Punk probably doesn't even realize that his health, safety, and well-being was as exploited by Dana White and Duke Roufus as it ever was by Vince McMahon and WWE.

Probably worse. For as bad as wrestling is for you, most wrestlers don't end up with pugilistic dementia. I remember when I was a kid, me and my cousin wanted to take up boxing, so we asked my uncle to take us to train and he looked at us and said, "no, everyone who boxes ends up with slurred speech." Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair were just on the Dan LeBatard show and even though both of their bodies are broken they are still cutting promos like its 1985.

 

How many former employees (sorry, independent contractors) of Vince McMahon did not reach the age of 60 or even 45? As much as he disgusts me, I highly doubt that number will ever be anything resembling like that for Dana White.

[supremebve]

 

 

The really sad part is that CM Punk probably doesn't even realize that his health, safety, and well-being was as exploited by Dana White and Duke Roufus as it ever was by Vince McMahon and WWE.

Probably worse. For as bad as wrestling is for you, most wrestlers don't end up with pugilistic dementia. I remember when I was a kid, me and my cousin wanted to take up boxing, so we asked my uncle to take us to train and he looked at us and said, "no, everyone who boxes ends up with slurred speech." Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair were just on the Dan LeBatard show and even though both of their bodies are broken they are still cutting promos like its 1985.

 

How many former employees (sorry, independent contractors) of Vince McMahon did not reach the age of 60 or even 45? As much as he disgusts me, I highly doubt that number will ever be anything resembling like that for Dana White.

 

Are we pretending that those were problems with the act of wrestling vs. the act of fighting in a cage? Drugs, steroids, suicide, etc. are problems with pro wrestling, but have much more to do with the culture around the sport than the sport itself. Everything about professional fighting from the practice to the actual fights is about trying to maximize the damage you do to your opponent. Wrestling on the other hand is about how to protect you and your opponent and minimizing damage. Neither are safe, but you are going to take a much bigger physical beating on the day to day fighting. Wrestling may be worse in the extreme long term, because wrestlers are able to wrestle for far longer than a professional fighter is able to fight. Honestly, go back and watch Chuck Liddel's fights, and note how quickly his prefight interviews go from sounding like an articulate dude who could do your taxes to almost unintelligible. If you start at the first Tito fight, he sounds like an English teacher, but by the second Tito fight he sound like a completely different human being. That is a two and a half year span. Unless there is a Steve Austin head drop or something, it can take a decade before a wrestler shows that kind of obvious trauma.

[SPS]

 

 

 

The really sad part is that CM Punk probably doesn't even realize that his health, safety, and well-being was as exploited by Dana White and Duke Roufus as it ever was by Vince McMahon and WWE.

Probably worse. For as bad as wrestling is for you, most wrestlers don't end up with pugilistic dementia. I remember when I was a kid, me and my cousin wanted to take up boxing, so we asked my uncle to take us to train and he looked at us and said, "no, everyone who boxes ends up with slurred speech." Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair were just on the Dan LeBatard show and even though both of their bodies are broken they are still cutting promos like its 1985.

 

How many former employees (sorry, independent contractors) of Vince McMahon did not reach the age of 60 or even 45? As much as he disgusts me, I highly doubt that number will ever be anything resembling like that for Dana White.

 

Are we pretending that those were problems with the act of wrestling vs. the act of fighting in a cage? Drugs, steroids, suicide, etc. are problems with pro wrestling, but have much more to do with the culture around the sport than the sport itself. Everything about professional fighting from the practice to the actual fights is about trying to maximize the damage you do to your opponent. Wrestling on the other hand is about how to protect you and your opponent and minimizing damage. Neither are safe, but you are going to take a much bigger physical beating on the day to day fighting. Wrestling may be worse in the extreme long term, because wrestlers are able to wrestle for far longer than a professional fighter is able to fight. Honestly, go back and watch Chuck Liddel's fights, and note how quickly his prefight interviews go from sounding like an articulate dude who could do your taxes to almost unintelligible. If you start at the first Tito fight, he sounds like an English teacher, but by the second Tito fight he sound like a completely different human being. That is a two and a half year span. Unless there is a Steve Austin head drop or something, it can take a decade before a wrestler shows that kind of obvious trauma.

 

 

I disagree with a few of your points, first MMA fighters have just as much steroids, drug, etc. culture as pro wrestling. There are tons of fighters from years past who admitted and have been caught with drugs and steroids to the point the UFC has had to shoot itself in the foot with USADA busting some of their top stars to quell the risk of scandal of their sport being revealed as "dirty".

 

Second the day to day training for a fighter during fight camp is more damaging and intense but they also get a hell of a lot more time off and few fight more than 3/4 times a year on the major stage compared to all the dates pro wrestlers in the past worked hurt or not. Also even Daniel Cormier said when he tried out pro wrestling that it was way harder bumping all the time than training for Olympic Wrestling or MMA because you have to let your opponent beat you up whereas in fighting you can control a lot of the damage coming your way or stop guys dead without taking any shots.

 

With Chuck Liddell sure he does have a significant change in his speech patterns and expressing his thoughts verbally but he was also a noted partier who was rumored to be a heavy cocaine user and drinker. Also since you mention Tito in your Chuck example he sounds the same from his UFC debut in 1997 to now and he took as many shots and trained harder than almost anyone of his era and came out fine.

 

As for wrestlers not showing trauma look at Foley during his prime years in the mid nineties, the man went from ECW/IWA Japan doing hardcore style and cutting the best promos of his career to WWF in the Attitude era only 2 years later and admitted in his book and in Beyond The Mat as suffering horrible memory loss and getting lost trying to find his own house driving home or his room in hotels on many occasions due to the increased amount of dates week in and week out causing way more wear and tear than the sporadic ECW/Japan commitments.

 

So it's not cut and dry and really comes down to the individual, their genetics, the damage they took and the way they took care of their bodies and health.