Bruce Lee vs Modern Martial Arts

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 11:59

Xordium said:
But the basic goal of BJJ is to do something with the position. At its purest form wrestling is about maintaining the position. That's why they then utilise such a strategy when they've gained the position.

Neither BJJ nor wrestling in their pure forms will help you with ground and pound. Neither sport teaches you to posture from any position but BJJ at least teaches you to posture in guard and sometimes mount (which you need to do to effectively ground and pound most of the time). BJJ in it's purest form is probably more applicable to ground and pound if anything because there are more attacking positions.

If you train BJJ and/or wrestling for MMA then both are effective for ground and pound. You will have to adapt your technique to do it but this is true of both disciplines.

Xordium · 8 Jul 2013 at 12:08

spoffle said:
In such a situation, how does technique get you past not being strong enough to perform an armbar?

It's not going to really happen though against good technique unless the size difference and strength is very large.

The person doing the armbar is using the muscles in: both arms, both legs, abdomen, chest shoulders and back

The person defending the armbar is using : one arm, one shoulder, and one side of the chest and the back.

That's a quite significant difference in leverage all other factors being equal.

Far easier to just spin out of it.

Xordium · 8 Jul 2013 at 12:10

ShortWarning said:
/snip

Well I think we'll have to disagree on this one. What forms of wrestling have you done out of interest and do you do BJJ?

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 12:34

Xordium said:
Well I think we'll have to disagree on this one. What forms of wrestling have you done out of interest and do you do BJJ?

A handful of freestyle wrestling classes. I train BJJ 3/4 times a week and MMA 1/2 times a week. I do quite a lot of wrestling for MMA (in MMA class).

Pure wrestling is more about take downs, bouts are won on points more than with pinning. Pinning in wrestling is about spreading your base and hugging the guy as tightly as possible. That is not effective for ground and pound.

PooBrain · 8 Jul 2013 at 12:36

Xordium said:
Ban Bruce Lee kicking, punching and grappling and my mum would have had him. Whatever next shall I claim my 5 year lad is cleverer than someone with a PhD by restricting every question exclusively to knowledge about Lego Star Wars figures.

Now you're taking it too far. You just can't admit that Bruce Lee would whoop all their asses if ground brawls where removed from the fights. Even in a straight, standing up toe to toe with the likes of Anderson Silva, Bruce Lee would trounce his ass.

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 12:49

PooBrain said:
Now you're taking it too far. You just can't admit that Bruce Lee would whoop all their asses if ground brawls where removed from the fights. Even in a straight, standing up toe to toe with the likes of Anderson Silva, Bruce Lee would trounce his ass.

What are you basing this on?

We've seen Anderson Silva fight and barring this weekend we've seen that he has excellent Muay Thai. Every single day he trains to fight.

When has Bruce Lee ever proved he can fight?

Do you believe someone who trains to look good on screen can beat a high level Muay Thai fighter?

Xordium · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:07

PooBrain said:
You just can't admit that Bruce Lee would whoop all their asses if ground brawls where removed from the fights.

Yes, I won't admit it because it is plainly stupid. Living up to your name again.

Random Guy · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:11

ShortWarning said:
That has little to do with what makes a great fighter. Knock out power is important but there have been champions without it especially in MMA where there are other ways you can win.

That wasn't the point I was trying to make - basically Lee was known for speed and precision. Combined with high Strike force IMO he is a force to be contended with in the Octagon.

Sure, in MMA there are numerous ways to win, but Lee never trained for the UFC. If MMA was around during his lifetime and it was one of his goals, you can bet your bottom dollar he would have worked on his ground-game.

Xordium · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:15

ShortWarning said:
A handful of freestyle wrestling classes. I train BJJ 3/4 times a week and MMA 1/2 times a week. I do quite a lot of wrestling for MMA (in MMA class).

Pure wrestling is more about take downs, bouts are won on points more than with pinning. Pinning in wrestling is about spreading your base and hugging the guy as tightly as possible. That is not effective for ground and pound.

Freestyle wrestling may be won on points but where most of the MMA fighters get their wrestling game from (folkstyle derived) the objective is to pin. And pinning is more about control rather than spreading your base.

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:19

Random Guy said:
That wasn't the point I was trying to make - basically Lee was known for speed and precision. Combined with high Strike force IMO he is a force to be contended with in the Octagon.

Sure, in MMA there are numerous ways to win, but Lee never trained for the UFC. If MMA was around during his lifetime and it was one of his goals, you can bet your bottom dollar he would have worked on his ground-game.

I agree with you. I think Lee had a ton of natural ability so if he trained for MMA he could have been good at MMA but it's an odd point to make.

The only reason we have champions is because they have dedicated their lives to training MMA. If someone trained football every day they will never be an MMA champ, no matter how much natural fighting ability they have.

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:23

Xordium said:
Freestyle wrestling may be won on points but where most of the MMA fighters get their wrestling game from (folkstyle derived) the objective is to pin. And pinning is more about control rather than spreading your base.

How can you effectively control if your base is wrong?

Freestyle/greco roman wrestling is very different to wrestling for MMA. There's no denying that having a wrestling background benefits but starting MMA as a black belt in BJJ also has major advantages. Both have to be adapted to the MMA game.

Raymond Lin · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:28

ShortWarning said:
What are you basing this on?

We've seen Anderson Silva fight and barring this weekend we've seen that he has excellent Muay Thai. Every single day he trains to fight.

When has Bruce Lee ever proved he can fight?

Do you believe someone who trains to look good on screen can beat a high level Muay Thai fighter?

Bruce Lee trained to look good on screen?

When he was a teenager training under Yip Man, you think he was thinking one day he would make it in Hollywood?

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:41

Raymond Lin said:
Bruce Lee trained to look good on screen?

When he was a teenager training under Yip Man, you think he was thinking one day he would make it in Hollywood?

The story goes he started training in Wing Chun because he got beaten up.

Once he started in films I have no doubt that's what his training was focused on. Either way he didn't fight (except for anecdotal street fights) so we'll never really know if he trained to fight or if his training would have been effective for fighting. Wing Chun wouldn't have helped him very much in MMA nowadays anyway.

Raymond Lin · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:46

ShortWarning said:
The story goes he started training in Wing Chun because he got beaten up.

Once he started in films I have no doubt that's what his training was focused on. Either way he didn't fight (except for anecdotal street fights) so we'll never really know if he trained to fight or if his training would have been effective for fighting. Wing Chun wouldn't have helped him very much in MMA nowadays anyway.

Exactly, we don't know, we can only guess.

Basically 300+ posts of people guessing.

Also, surely a street fight would be more brutal than any orgainised MMA fights. With no referee or probably any rules of any kind.

Again, we can only guess, the guy is dead. It is all hypothetical, we will never know.

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 13:52

Raymond Lin said:
Exactly, we don't know, we can only guess.

Basically 300+ posts of people guessing.

Also, surely a street fight would be more brutal than any orgainised MMA fights. With no referee or probably any rules of any kind.

Again, we can only guess, the guy is dead. It is all hypothetical, we will never know.

Exactly. I think this is the point that most people are missing.

There is no way of knowing how good a fighter he was because he didn't fight. People think he would beat 99% of MMA guys because of his legend. Maybe he was the greatest fighter of all time but he's never done anything to show us this.

ShaolinDreams · 8 Jul 2013 at 14:17

hurfdurf said:
I think BJJ is massively over rated these days in all but a few areas, as wrestling trumps it 9/10 times, or at least renders it useless, how ever your friend must be new to BJJ if you let him arm bar you and you simply dumbbell flied him. Mariuz Pudzonovski (worlds strongest man x 3) has been beaten by BJJ techniques twice by people who were a lot less strong than him.

5 times.

ShortWarning said:
Exactly. I think this is the point that most people are missing.

There is no way of knowing how good a fighter he was because he didn't fight. People think he would beat 99% of MMA guys because of his legend. Maybe he was the greatest fighter of all time but he's never done anything to show us this.

He invented Jeet Kune Do.. which in essence is MMA, the stuff you guys love so much.

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 14:30

Jeet Kune Do was more of a philosophy than a MA but yes I agree. How many times did he fight and use his Jeet Kune Do in competition or even any non-sanctioned but documented fights?

arknor · 8 Jul 2013 at 15:24

ShortWarning · 8 Jul 2013 at 17:39

Enjoyed that. Thanks for sharing.

Raymond Lin · 8 Jul 2013 at 20:01

arknor said:

Fascinating.