1995-2005 mma > 2005 - 2015 mma

The late 90s and early 00s were the best decade of MMA. I really like those fights and the pioneers who fought. Pride was a much better promotion than modern UFC with better production, better rules and had fighters who were great warriors with colorful personalities. Fedor, Cro Cop, Igor Vovchanchyn, Sakuraba, Randleman, Wanderlei, Rampage, Nogueira etc. They fought like 4 times a year too. Pride had that aura of violence, you always had that feeling that something really violent is going to happen. I also like those old Vale Tudo tournaments, those fighters had to have massive ***** to fight under basically no rules format in shady promotions.

Check out Yuki Nakai, the guy fought 3 guys much larger than him in 1 night (in Vale Tudo Japan tournament), beat two of them and permanently lost eyesight on one eye. When modern UFC fans say that someone like Conor is warrior for fighting a guy who's a bit larger than him I can only laugh. In Pride this was the norm, Sakuraba would fight anyone anytime.

People think that I'm anti-MMA because I **** on UFC all the time but quite the opposite, I love the true so-called "MMA" which was represented in Vale Tudo and Pride. UFC basically ruined it with its watered-down rules and trying to present itself as boxing for middle class American white people or something like that.

There's something mythical to "MMA" (it wasn't even called like that) in that late 90s-early 00s era, I have massive respect for most of those fighters.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWKjhoHvxD8

Here's a good tribute to Pride. I forgot to say that the ring is so much better than Dana White's human ****fighting cage

Fedor and Cro Cop hugging in the dark at the end, two legendary warriors who had nothing but respect for other fighters and didn't need to use WWE-style antics. What a great era of fighting

 

Not really. The only one who went on a long undefeated streak was Fedor, the other guys racked up a lot of losses but the great thing about Pride was that they didn't care about fighters having 0 Ls and that ****, they just organized all the fights the people wanted and they did it as often as possible.

There were 3 top HWs Fedor, Cro Cop and Nogueira but Cro Cop lost a lot of fights even in his prime, there were dangerous fighters like Randleman, Barnett, Coleman, Vovchanchyn, Kharitonov, even young Werdum etc. who could beat anyone on their day.

And those guys who actually were superior like Fedor.. I don't get how people criticize him for fighting supposedly "low level" competition of "one dimensional" fighters. Fedor wasn't transported to that age with time machine, he had the same ****ty (by today's standards) training like everyone else, he didn't train at ATT, Tristar or Jackson's. All of those fighters were pioneers in the unknown territory and those who came to the top were pure talents who would be great in this era too if they were born a bit later.

There were mismatches no doubt, but as I said in the first post, those fighters fought 3-5 times a year or even more. Today, UFC fighters fight 1-2 times a year. Fighting 2 top guys and 3 cans is obviously harder than fighting just 2 top guys. You have to go through camp for each fight which takes a toll on your body and you can still lose the fight or get damaged. Fedor broke his hand against Goodridge and was never the same again.

Some of those freakshow fights happened because the Japanese public wanted to see that stuff, it kept the Pride promotion alive. I have no problem with an organization having some pro-wrestlers and giant freaks if the alternative is not having that promotion at all.

 

That's like comparing really early boxing ATGs to modern boxers.

Jon Jones is a bit overrated too. He has been avoiding UFC HW division so far and this current HW division is worse than Pride. I mean half of who's who of Pride heavyweights used to be highly ranked in the UFC not so long ago or still are (Nogueira, Barnett, Hunt, Werdum, Cro Cop, Overeem...) and there are other fighters from that era who're still relevant (Arlovski, Mir). Pride recruited legit talent from other sports like judo, wrestling and kickboxing.

First time Jon Jones fought someone his size he arguably lost (Gustafsson), I can see PRIME Fedor, Nogueira and Cro Cop giving him a hell of a fight and likely beat him (Barnett is a tough fight for him too). Especially Nogueira would be a nightmare match up for him, Jon Jones got his hand broken by a middleweight Vitor Belfort, he would have massive problems with Nog's ground game. Fedor was good of his back too and would negate Jon Jones' clinch with his Sambo/Judo. Remember that Pride didn't allow elbows and you couldn't eyepoke with those gloves. No grinding against the cage either.

 

I don't think he needs to move up but he doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence with legends like Fedor who fought at the HW division undersized. Fedor could have probably cut weight to fight in the MW.