Who is the more effective grappler between Sonnen and Munoz?

About even, Munoz has a slight edge as he can actually finish fights and defend submission

 

Nate is not a great wrestler fella

 

Sonnen is not an effective grappler. Effective grapplers dont get submitted every time the fight hits the mat.

 

both of these statements are correct.


I give Mark a significant edge.
And I would take Aaron Simpsons wrestling over Okami and Chael as well.

Mark was able to hold off a World Class grappling 1%er in Maia and gave him fits.
Demian barely caught him once and Mark was out of there in a second.
You all saw what Maiia did to Chael.


Chael has been finished more times than I can remember.

 

Yeah I like Munoz as a challenger a lot. While Sonnen or Belfort would make for a tremendous spectacle in Brazil and it'd be cool (but very unlikely) to see Bisping challenge Silva over here, Munoz to me is the fighter with the best all round style to pose a problem for Silva. He hits hard (unlike Chael), he can defend submissions (unlike Chael) and it'll be funny to see how Anderson freaks out when he's made to fight a training partner.

 

Lets not forget he laid on top of Silva for 4 and a bit rounds and did next to no damage thats not very effective IMO

 

Sonnen and it's not particularly close. I think a few of you are conflating BJJ with grappling when it's a subset of.

Doubt Chael would have gottten taken down by Leben at all, let alone 3-4 times.

 

Only twice in the first round. First time was a suprize that he actually went for a takedown. 2nd time was off a clinch knee counter and both times Mark was back up about 1 second later. Then he readjusted and Leben came nowhere near taking him down again.

I'm not sure what 'conflating' means in your language but Maia's overal grappling for MMA is as topdog as they come and Mark went heads up with it for 3 rounds without being much in danger whereas Chael was subbed in 3 seconds.

 

chael sonnen with ease

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Sonnen in every aspect apart from sub defence.

 

Apparently they wrestled in college and Munoz dominated Chael pretty badly. However, that was at least a decade ago and Munoz's wrestling hasn't translated to MMA as well as you'd think a national champion's would. Also look how Chael rag dolled Okami and Munoz couldn't even get the fight to the ground. I'd go with Chael.

 

Absolutely. Chael left himself open for the often used flying triangle.

I do recall there being a decent amount of controversy with Munoz winning against Maia at all. Being outstruck by Maia is something to be embarassed about.

So, yes, Munoz wasn't submitted by Maia but I suppose that's likely to not happen when he's not actively looking for a submission and is beating up Munoz on the feet. (That even sounds weird to say)

 

According to Sherdog he's been finished 8 times.

Anyway, what makes Munoz so effective is that he can do so much damage without having to commit as much as Sonnen does. Munoz can do damage when postured up in guard whereas Sonnen needs to lean into it quite a bit more and ends up putting himself in much more dangerous situations.

People are mixing up "takedowns" with "grappling" and "ground and pound". They're not the same thing folks. Munoz has much better ground and pound whereas it seems like Sonnen has better takedowns. In terms of "grappling" meaning "control on the ground", Sonnen seems to be able to hold guys down better but in doing so puts himself in positions to get subbed more. There is no one answer to this, it seems to me.

This would be a fun fight to watch, by the way.