BJ Penn vs. Rickson Gracie Prime for Prime

His power and ferocity would help, yes, but it would be clearly his sambo who would help him to kick Rickson's ass

 

H A T E R A I D.

It's not just for dinner.

 

Fair enough - but circumstances killed the Sakuraba fight - not an unwillingness to fight. Sakuraba's victory over Royler was tainted due to an improper referee stoppage - so Rickson felt he could no longer compete in Pride with the Japanese working everything to their advantage. He fought the next best thing to Sakuraba who was Funaki in a different organization. Funaki who holds wins over proven fighters Ken Shamrock, Frank Shamrock, Bas Rutten, Guy Mezger, Jason Delucia.

Next, Rickson's son was killed in an accident and it effectively killed his career - although he was well past his prime when he fought Funaki. Saying Rickson would lose because other fighters lost is a spurious comparison at best.

 

Jacare is amazing, Rickson was amazing, but Jacare and others at least deserves to be thought of in the same class. In my mind competition builds the overall level of sports over time, and it has increased probably 10x since Rickson was in his physical prime.

From what I hear about Rickson, on the ground is still elite level for elite level, but again, that is just what I hear, it could be people being a little starstruck, it could be being polite and paying omage, or it could even be that he's even better than what is said.

I've seen fighters fight alright against Rickson, its not like he always won in dominating clinical fashion.

This topic (overall, not this thread) has gotten overblown on both sides, we will never know, and part of that is Ricksons fault for fighting who he did instead of who he should have, but even when he was fighting he was probably a little past prime physically, especially later, so that helps to explain it.

The game has definatly grown just through putting more people into the machine, but Rickson has probably picked up on that now, but it wasn't there as much when he was fighting, so at the very least it shouldn't be called "hating", sacrelige, and what have you, to say that modern jiu jitsu guys could beat him. Today people seem to reach the peak of what is possible, only to be bested.

As an example Drysdale has caught up, possibly even passed the Marcelo Garcia's, Jacare's, Roger Gracie's, this just shows the sport always produces more and more talented people the more people compete. With more and more talented people, the talent level likely goes up some too, Its just natural that the more people their are, the more great people there are.