Carwin vs Lesnar?

Training
121

Senateguy,

I like your spectrum example, certainly Lesnar is not in the over all skill category of the few you listed, (however his wrestling ability is greater than the average in that group and that’s really where this all began). I would place Lesnar far closer to “the gifted ones” than you might. But, because he also has incredible size and power many underestimate his skill. Size and power are clearly on display every time he steps into the octagon, skill is something that is more subtle and harder to pin point so in Lesnar’s case it gets over looked by some. Oh wait, I think this is where we began.

122

Size, strength, speed, and agility are all “skills” if they are obtained through training. Unless you think Lesnar was born with all of these and has not trained them, the majority of this discussion is silly.

So is focussing on, and seemingly discrediting, why someone wins instead of the fact that they are winning. Somehow training and successfully using size, strength, speed, and agility is less impressive than training and successfully using BJJ or striking? I don’t get it.

123

Wrestling is not a singular action. One can be a superior wrestler for many reasons.

Great throws
Great trips
Great single leg
Great double leg
Great TD defense
Great conditioning
Great speed and agility
Great strength
Great mat awareness or intellegence
Aggressiveness

These are all skills. Two men wrestle. One man wins. Does it matter why? The one that had his hand raised is the better wrestler.

124

If this fight ever happens Carwin will not be able to handle Brock. If you atch when Carwin fought Gonzaga he was taken down with out to much problem by gonzaga. Gabriel is a great grappaler but not the athlete and wrestler that brock is.

125

[quote]dhickey wrote:
Two men wrestle. One man wins. Does it matter why? [/quote]

Unless you’re one of the participants and want to know exactly why you’re winning, it doesn’t mean a thing. However, if you’re bored and you have this great forum to dissect it piece by piece, with other students of the game, well why not?

126

[quote]ZEB wrote:
dhickey wrote:
Two men wrestle. One man wins. Does it matter why?

Unless you’re one of the participants and want to know exactly why you’re winning, it doesn’t mean a thing. However, if you’re bored and you have this great forum to dissect it piece by piece, with other students of the game, well why not? [/quote]

Maybe I didn’t make my point very clearly. The man that wins is a more skilled wrestler. It doesn’t matter if the other guy has a better single-leg or escapes. Somehow, we’ve gotten to where some skills are discounted and don’t count for some reason. Like strength, size, speed, and general atheticism. Again, if they are trained and are useful in competing they are skills the same and any other.

127

[quote]ZEB wrote:
Senateguy,

I like your spectrum example, certainly Lesnar is not in the over all skill category of the few you listed, (however his wrestling ability is greater than the average in that group and that’s really where this all began).
[/quote]

I’d agree with that, with the exception of GSP and maybe Penn.

[quote]
I would place Lesnar far closer to “the gifted ones” than you might. But, because he also has incredible size and power many underestimate his skill. Size and power are clearly on display every time he steps into the octagon, skill is something that is more subtle and harder to pin point so in Lesnar’s case it gets over looked by some. Oh wait, I think this is where we began.[/quote]

I never said that he wasn’t close (I actually said he was quickly approaching that level), just not there yet and still more physical than skillful. Again, I’m not saying that he lacks skill by any means, just that he’s not yet at a level of outstanding technical ability (save for maybe his top control, I would say he’s pretty outstanding in that regard).

128

[quote]dhickey wrote:
Size, strength, speed, and agility are all “skills” if they are obtained through training. Unless you think Lesnar was born with all of these and has not trained them, the majority of this discussion is silly.
[/quote]

To an extent yes, but many of those attributes are heavily genetically predetermined. I doubt that Lesnar trained that much harder than a lot of other naturally big guys, but he was able to obtain levels of strength, speed, agility (and size to an extent) that the vast majority of them were not.

Let’s face it the guy is just athletically gifted. So yes, in a manner of speaking he was born with many of those “skills”.

[quote]
So is focussing on, and seemingly discrediting, why someone wins instead of the fact that they are winning. Somehow training and successfully using size, strength, speed, and agility is less impressive than training and successfully using BJJ or striking? I don’t get it.[/quote]

This I totally agree with. No matter what people want to credit his wins to, the fact still remains that he wins.

129

[quote]drewh wrote:
Wrong!

Hughes dominated because of his superior wrestling ability. Look not only at his record but the people that he beat. And what did GSP do more of AFTER Hughes beat him in their first fight? He traine heavily with the Canadian Olympic Wrestling team, and what happened after they met again? GSP dominated Hughes! Did he do it because he magically became more athletic? No. He did it because he beat Hughes at his own game, and of course had superior striking ability. You are also wrong about Hughes “solid striking ability”. Hughes has poor hands, very poor, that’s one reason he chose to take a tired and beaten BJ Penn to the Matt and finish him there when he could have easily knocked him out on his feet HAD HE ACTUALLY HAD SOLID STRIKING.
[/quote]

Hughes was an all american wrestler, so no one is saying that he didn’t have wrestling skill. But if you watch most of his earlier fights (before he lost the title to Penn) you’ll constantly hear Rogan noting how freakishly strong Hughes is/was. He actually won the title (from Newton) due to his freakish strength (being able to pick Newton up to his shoulders from being in a triangle choke, walking around the octagon, and then slaming him into the mat), not due to his superior wrestling ability. He beat Trigg, Verissimo, and Penn (the second time) for much the same reasons.

After he lost the title he realized that he indeed did need to further develop his skill set and developed a solid submission game (which he showcased against GSP in their first match), and striking game (though he never developed it to the level of his grappling skills).

That’s why once GSP actually developed his wrestling to a high level he was able to beat Hughes, because Hughes’ wrestling wasn’t actually as high caliber as you are making it out to be. The third time they fought GSP made Hughes look like a total amateur because his wrestling had reached a very high level. If Hughes’ wrestling skill was so high, GSP wouldn’t have been able to surpass him so easily.

Yes, I have. Take a look at the videos of Schultz and Mills. Neither were particularly strong, fast, flexible, or agile, yet they both won a lot of wrestling matches due to their superior technique.

[quote]
BJ broke a rib he was putting on a clinic until that happened.[/quote]

Penn was outstriking Hughes up until that point. I would agree that he was always a better striker than Hughes. But it was only a matter of time until he ran out of gas (which seems to happen in all of his WW fights) and Hughes had the strength and conditioning to take him into deep water and “drown” him.

Whether he actually broke a rib or not, maybe, maybe not I don’t know for certain (honestly doubt he actually broke one though, bruised badly perhaps). Regardless, his conditioning has always been an issue at WW.

130

[quote]acantare wrote:
If this fight ever happens Carwin will not be able to handle Brock. If you atch when Carwin fought Gonzaga he was taken down with out to much problem by gonzaga. Gabriel is a great grappaler but not the athlete and wrestler that brock is. [/quote]

After taking a good punch to the face and having his nose broken for the first time.

Gonzaga did a great job of capitalizing and deserves credit for the takedown. Still, even with his grappling skill he couldn’t keep Carwin down, and once it got back to the feet BOOM one right hand and the fight was over.

We’ve yet to really see Brock in the same sort of trouble (which he deserves credit for), so it’s hard to say how he would have reacted. I suspect that it would have been very similarly though.

131

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
ZEB wrote:
still more physical than skillful. [/quote]

I would say that his skill exceeds his great physicaly capacity.

132

[quote]dhickey wrote:

Maybe I didn’t make my point very clearly. The man that wins is a more skilled wrestler. It doesn’t matter if the other guy has a better single-leg or escapes. Somehow, we’ve gotten to where some skills are discounted and don’t count for some reason. Like strength, size, speed, and general atheticism. Again, if they are trained and are useful in competing they are skills the same and any other. [/quote]

I don’t think that’s the case with the Brock Lesnar debate. Lesnar is getting plenty of credit for his physical attributes. In fact, so much so that many take away credit for hisother
attributes such as his precision, movement and quality of his moves. They assume (wrongly) that his accomplishments are through brute force rather than pure skill. Of course it’s a combination of both, but more skill than anything else as other big men who have less skill have not achieved what he has.

133

So we are saying Lesnar is the best wrestler because he beat Randy, who shouldn’t even have been fighting in the HW division?

I have yet to see him beat someone who is a decent wrestler AND his physical equal. Everyone he beat is much smaller- so just shut the fuck up and enjoy the KO Carwin is gonna lay on Brock (if the fight ever happens?)

134

Bad news guys, Brock hust got the sniffles the fight has been postponed again.

135

[quote]Therizza wrote:
So we are saying Lesnar is the best wrestler because he beat Randy, who shouldn’t even have been fighting in the HW division?[/quote]

I’m not saying that Brock is “the best wrestler”. You’ll have to ask others if they are saying it.

You may have a difficult time finding such a person. Carwin while closer than most in ability (Division II champion vs Division I champion) lacks the size height and weight. But he’s close and his other attributes might just make up for it. He might beat Lesnar, could happen, but I’d still bet on Lesnar to win if I had to bet the fight.

[quote] Everyone he beat is much smaller
[/quote]

I wonder what that means? Are you claiming that the larger man always wins? Did you not read the previous debate on this thread? Okay, I’ll give you just one name: Bob Sapp. He has lost to much smaller opponents. There are many, many others. Brock Lesnar wins because he has size, strength, speed AND a great amount of skill.

(Yawn) Okay, I’m now sick of this topic.

:slight_smile:

136

My my. Not a day goes by that Brock Lesnar’s name isn’t discussed. Crazyness.

137

[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
My my. Not a day goes by that Brock Lesnar’s name isn’t discussed. Crazyness.[/quote]

lmao, i’ve been thinking the same thing. brock and dana are laughing all the way to the bank on this one. when he wins again, his detractors will again cite on his sheer size as the reason for his vicory, and his lack of true “skill” (that ambiguously defined characteristic that encompasses so much when really, it basically comes down to winning and losing) as their reason for failing to enjoy his win.

when he loses again, his detractors will fall back on that same thing, saying they only knew it was a matter of time before some big guy with better skill defeated him. this debate has been run ad nasuem throughout mma’s history. as members of a website promoting strength, weight-training, etc, it is ridiculous that you guys still diminish strength as an attribute.

138

[quote]slimjim wrote:
brock and dana are laughing all the way to the bank on this one.
[/quote]

Dana is laughing especially hard since the UFC by one estimate (Forbes Magazine) is now worth in the neighborhood of 1 billion dollars. I guess it pays handsomely to underpay the best fighters in the world, at least for now.

139

[quote]ZEB wrote:
slimjim wrote:
brock and dana are laughing all the way to the bank on this one.

Dana is laughing especially hard since the UFC by one estimate (Forbes Magazine) is now worth in the neighborhood of 1 billion dollars. I guess it pays handsomely to underpay the best fighters in the world, at least for now.

[/quote]

is this the only tune you know?

140

[quote]ZEB wrote:
slimjim wrote:
brock and dana are laughing all the way to the bank on this one.

Dana is laughing especially hard since the UFC by one estimate (Forbes Magazine) is now worth in the neighborhood of 1 billion dollars. I guess it pays handsomely to underpay the best fighters in the world, at least for now.

[/quote]

Not to rain on your ufc hater parade any more than I already have, but let’s take a look at the forbes article you have hanging on your wall.

Your copy may be worn out so I will summarize:

Forbes does not estimate the UFC to be worth $1B. The UFC does. Important distinction?

Forbes quote dollars the UFC “generates”. This includes PPV $ they only get a portion of and ticket reciepts they only get a portion of. Important distinction?

Forbes writes:

“The price, if they could get it, would be rich in comparison with the $1.4 billion market value for publicly traded World Wrestling Entertainment (nyse: WWE - news - people ), which has almost double the revenue.”

Now, I have not taken a peek at their (WWE)10k, but I am going to guess their reported revenue does not include revenue they generated for other companies and only revenue they actually took in. I would guess the SEC would prefer it this way.

As we discussed, none of this really gives us any insight into the numbers that really matter or who is walking away with too much cash by your standards. A company being worth $10B doesn’t guarentee anyone is walking away with any cash just yet. That’s how investments work. You delay immediate gratification with the hope of that investment paying off in the future.

I just thought we might as well start with some accurate assumptions for your arbitrary swag.