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Eddie Bravo Previews Ken Shamrock v Kimo
Reported By: Boxing Insider - 02/01/2005 06:20 PM
BoxingInsider.com Interview with Eddie Bravo
Boxinginsider.com: Ken Shamrock has had a lot of time off between his last four fights. Do you think his absence is hurting him or helping him?
Eddie Bravo: It could hurt him. I mean he must have developed a lot of ring rust. It can also help him, depending on how injured he was. He did have a knee injury so maybe the time off gave him a chance to totally regenerate his whole body -- but no doubt he will have some ring rust to knock off.
Boxinginsider.com: An ACL injury is serious. Do you think it was the best move for Ken to come back with a big fight like this right after his surgery?
Eddie Bravo: It's a good idea for the fans. No one wants to see Ken Shamrock against some tomato can. I think it's a good move. Kimo is not a top-ten fighter right now. It's a perfect fight for him. But Kimo is tough and he's got a big name. I think it's perfect.
Boxinginsider.com: Kimo's been training jujitsu and Erik Paulson has been training Ken. How do you think that Kimo's jujitsu will set him up against Ken's raw skills, mixed in with Paulson who has definitely helped him with a lot of his techniques and updated his styles? How does this match up?
Eddie Bravo: I think Kimo's jujitsu will definitely help him in the fight, but Ken Shamrock is really good on the ground, too, so it's a tough one to call. Ken was better on the ground the first time they met. It was clear that Ken was better than Kimo on the ground, but that was a long time ago and, as you said, Kimo has been working on his jujitsu over the last several years and he's got his black belt in jujitsu as well. Will that be enough to beat Ken Shamrock on the ground? It's going to be a hard one to call.
Boxinginsider.com: Now how do you see this match unfolding? How does Kimo best use his jujitsu to beat Ken Shamrock and how does Ken Shamrock best use his skills to beat Kimo's jujitsu?
Eddie Bravo: I think it's going to be really hard to submit Ken Shamrock even though Kimo has been training jujitsu for a while. The way I see the fight unfolding is that I see Kimo fatiguing. I see him gassing and I see Ken Shamrock winning late in the fight by TKO.
Boxinginsider.com: There is a lot of talk that if Ken Shamrock is victorious at UFC 48 there is a possible rematch with Tito Ortiz within the next couple of UFCs. With a healthy Ken Shamrock do you think the outcome of that match would be any different and would a rematch with Tito Ortiz be a match that you would like to see?
Eddie Bravo: Yes it would be a match that I would like to see again and I think Ken Shamrock would do a lot better with Tito a second time around, especially if his knee is 100 percent healthy, but I don't see Ken Shamrock beating Tito the second time. I see him doing a lot better but I still see Tito pulling it out. He's a lot younger. He's in fantastic cardiovascular shape and he is always improving himself, so I think it will be a closer match. It won't be as lopsided as it was in the first fight, but I think Tito Ortiz can still pull that fight out.
Boxinginsider.com: What would Ken Shamrock have to show you personally in this fight coming up with Kimo to say that he has evolved and to beat criticisms that the old school were unable to hang with today's MMA fighters?
Eddie Bravo: Ken has always had a good ground game and with pretty good hands as well, but if Ken ends up on his back and he has Kimo in his guard -- if he could attack off his back with arm bars and triangles or even leg locks off his back if he attacks, then I will say that he has evolved. We really haven't seen Ken Shamrock work off his back too much, especially in the Tito fight. He was on his back quite often and he never really attacked. He was defending, just surviving. Maybe that had something to do with his knee, but for me to think that he has evolved he would have to develop a game off his back.
Boxinginsider.com: Now you have mentioned in the past that one of your very first early funny memories evolved Ken Shamrock -- that you actually learned a move or two by watching him do it on the UFC on the videotape. I was wondering if you could unlock that story.
Eddie Bravo: The first move I learned off him wasn't off the UFC. It was actually off Ken Shamrock's instructional video tape. There was a toehold -- just a basic toehold, but I loved it and I ended up putting it into my game early in my jujitsu career. I was really good at it and I've still got it. I just don't go to it that often any more because I feel that leg locks are too dangerous, especially in an MMA fight. I don't want to develop that MMA habit because I think that going for toeholds and leg locks are too risky in MMA. So I don't want to develop those habits, but early in my jujitsu career, with the toehold I learned off Ken Shamrock -- I was killing people with it.
The second move I learned from Ken was this move I learned from UFC3. They have a B-roll of him practicing. He's in jeans and he's practicing with a Japanese guy, and he had him in judo side control and got him in an armbar with his legs. I never even knew the name for it, but it's like a side headlock, side control, and then you trap your opponent's arm between your legs and you tweak it that way. I was doing that for a while, too.
Boxinginsider.com: You mention that you think the leg locks are dangerous, that being Ken Shamrock's signature move. Can you elaborate on why you feel the leg lock is a dangerous move and you don't recommend people go to it?
Eddie Bravo: I think leg locks are risky for MMA. If you just pay attention to all the leg lock attempts in MMA -- many times someone goes for a leg lock they leave their opponent's hands free -- free to bomb on them.
It happens so much in MMA: Frank Mir / Ian Freeman, he got killed going for leg locks; Rumina Sato against Joaqiem Hanson, got killed going for leg locks; "Cafe" Dantas against [I think it was] Gan McGee -- got killed going for leg locks. It's just too dangerous. You've got to round up your opponent's arms. You can't leave your opponent's arms free to punch you.
Another reason is that a lot of times leg locks aren't always adrenaline proof. A lot of people tap in the gym, in their training, because they don't want to get hurt. So the guy pulling off the leg locks starts to rely on them because people tap quick in class, but in the cage and in the ring -- when there's a lot of money on the line and alot of adrenaline pumping through your system-- it doesn't seem that people tap that often to leg locks, -- with all that adrenaline going, they don't seem to feel it.
Look at Ken Shamrock against Don Frye. Ken Shamrock had Don Frye in serious leg locks but Don Frye just took him. He even got injured but, you know what, Don Frye won. It just seems that leg locks aren't adrenalin proof. That is why I choose to attack the neck -- and master the neck and make that my habit, going after the neck, because it doesn't matter how much adrenaline you've got pumping through your veins -- if you've got a good rear naked neck choke on, if you've got a good triangle on, and you're focused on the neck, your opponent can be on PCP, he's still either going to have to tap or go to sleep.
So that is why I choose to master going after the neck instead of the legs. Another reason is that when you're attacking someone's legs, you're attacking your opponent's strongest limbs. You're attacking your opponent's strength. It's better to attack his neck and his arms. They are weaker. Why would you want to attack the stronger limbs?
And leg locks are the only submissions where -- if you go for a leg lock, your opponent can go for a leg lock on you. You could try to get a heel hook on someone and they could turn it around and get a heel hook on you. There's no other submission like that.
If I am working for an arm lock on you, you're not going for an arm lock on me. You're not in the right position. If I'm going for a triangle on you, you're not going for a triangle on me. If I'm going for a rear naked choke on you, there's no way you could rear naked choke me. But if you are going for ankle locks, your opponent can also go for your ankles.
So all in all, I think leg locks are way too risky for MMA, but for submission wrestling they're great. This just my philosophy, I could be totally full of shit.
Eddie Bravo is a boxinginsider.com contributor and can be reached at twisterbravo@sbcglobal.net
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