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Eddie Bravo: UFC 2003 Year In Review
Reported By: Boxing Insider - 02/01/2005 06:06 PM
By Eddie Bravo for BoxingInsider.com
Boxinginsider.com: The UFC had five shows in 2003. Can you give us your thoughts on each show of the year?
Eddie Bravo: Last year definitely proved that you really can't predict too much this sport. MMA is so unpredictable. Starting with the heavily-favored Ricco Rodriguez in his title defense against Tim Sylvia -- not too many people picked Sylvia to win but Ricco went down hard. Then you had, in the light heavyweight division, two "unstoppable" fighters going down -- both by the same fighter. First, Chuck Liddell got taken out by Randy Couture, then the "invincible" Tito Ortiz got totally dominated by Randy a couple months after that. A lot of great fighters went down hard last year.
Boxinginsider.com: Specifically, who are the UFC fighters of the year?
Eddie Bravo: No doubt, Randy Couture and Matt Hughes. Randy Couture, after losing the heavyweight title to Ricco Rodriguez, came back really strong -- dropped some weight, got into tremendous shape, and just took over the light heavyweight division -- destroying Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz. And Matt Hughes just continued on his rampage -- taking out Sean Sherk and Frank Trigg -- he's proving to be one of the best pound for pound fighters ever.
Boxinginsider.com: What was the best performance of 2003?
Eddie Bravo: I would have to say Randy Couture beating down Chuck Liddell. His victory over Tito Ortiz was just as impressive, but he stopped Chuck Liddell by TKOing him -- that was pretty shocking. Everybody was just shocked after that fight -- shocked at how lopsided the fight was, and shocked at how Randy dominated the fight. It was pretty amazing.
Boxinginsider.com: What are your favorite fights of 2003?
Eddie Bravo: First of all, I have to include the Matt Hughes/Frank Trigg fight. That fight was very highly anticipated and even though it ended pretty quickly, the ending was pretty dramatic and one of a kind. That rear naked choke was something out of WWE. Frank Trigg standing up as he got rear naked choked was pretty incredible to watch. I was right there as the crowd went nuts.
Another fight that stood out last year was the Rich Crunkilton/Hermes Franca fight. That's going to be a hard fight to forget -- the way Hermes Franca just kept attacking Rich Crunkilton off his back and the way he tore Rich's left arm completely apart. And Rich Crunkilton never tapped in the fight, he took the pain and went the distance even though Hermes destroyed his left arm. You combine Franca's technique with Rich Crunkilton's heart and you've got one of the all-time greats right there.
Boxinginsider.com: Give us your thoughts on Randy Couture's achievements in 2003. Why do you think he was so successful?
Eddie Bravo: I think Randy Couture's successful because he's really smart. He knew what he had to do to become a champion once again. He knew he had todrop down to light heavyweight. His two losses came to much larger opponents in the heavyweight division-- Josh Barnett and Ricco Rodriguez. He did the smart thing by moving down to light heavyweight. And to do that you have to get into tremendous shape and that's exactly what he did. I've never seen him in that kind of shape before. He just did what he had to do.
He took down Chuck Liddell -- who is very hard to take down, he took him down and he kept him down, mounted him and pounded him. He also dominated Tito Ortiz -- he took him down and gave him a taste of his own medicine -- which was a good grounding and pounding. I think Randy Couture, above everything, is one of the smartest fighters on the planet right now. And I think that has a lot to do with his success. He knows what he has to do and he does it, his work ethic is incredible.
Boxinginsider.com: Throughout the evolution of this sport, there have been shifts in the dominance of different styles -- jiu-jitsu, wrestling, kickboxing -- where do you think the sport is at now?
Eddie Bravo: Right now the sport is dominated by wrestlers who can strike well because there are so few submission specialists in the sport at this time. There's alot of world champion jiu jitsu players in MMA right now but it takes a long time to make the transition from being a great gi fighter to being a great MMA fighter. Some never make the transition. Some jiu-jitsu champions never get good without the gi. They relied so much on the gi for success in the amateur ranks that once they hit the MMA scene they have very little no-gi submission set ups. In the beginning of the UFC, Brazilian jiu jitsu dominated because at that point you could come in and do an MMA fight and still have all the gi habits from the amateur scene and still win and dominate because no-one had any ground experience.
But now those gi habits are coming back to bite the jiu-jitsu style in the ass because every MMA fighter is doing no-gi jiu-jitsu now, and you can't be successful in MMA with just gi set ups in your arsenal. For jiu-jitsu to make a huge comeback, BJJ fighters would have to specialize in grappling without the gi and having set-ups that don't require the gi. Right now there are a few people who are figuring it out -- Minotauro has figured it out, for example. There is just a handful of guys out there who are submission specialists and who are known for submitting their opponents without the gi. There aren't many, so right now the sport is dominated by world-class wrestlers who can strike. It will change. Eventually it's going to come back to the submission specialists. It's going to evolve back to that.
We saw that in Pride. Look at Cro Cop. Cro Cop was taking everybody out. There's really nobody on the planet who can stand with him right now in MMA. He's the most vicious striker in the world. The only guy to have had a chance to beat him was Minotauro, because he's a guy who could not only take him down, but submit him. There are a lot of fighters who could take Cro Cop down, including most of the world-class wrestlers in the sport, but they wouldn't be able to submit him. And that's what the future is: the more K1 fighters come down into MMA, the harder it is going to be for them -- the wrestlers/strikers to continue to win standing. They're going to have to revert back to their wrestling, yet they're going to have to be very proficient at no-gi jiu-jitsu to finish off these strikers as well, especially in the passing the guard department. Or, with stand-ups from the end of rounds and the dreaded "ref stand ups", these wrestlers/strikers are going to get knocked out.
Right now the wrestlers are doing fine because there's really only one K-1fighter, Cro Cop, who is dominating MMA, but Jerome Lebanner is coming and a whole wave of these K1 guys are going to start doing MMA, sowrestlers/strikers are going to have to learn some serious no-gi jiu-jitsu eventually. And that's where I see the sport evolving -- back to jiu-jitsu.
Next week Eddie Bravo will talk about UFC in 2004, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and Matt Hughes.
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