and did millions of people in the western world see them in fist of fury and enter the dragon? atsch the luckiest thing that ever happened to lee is that he died at the peak of his fame.
I don't know how many people in the Western world were exposed to those Jet Li types during Lee's era. I think you're focusing too much on the movies. And Lee did make entertaining movies, but I'm more interested in his actual research into fighting and cross training. Up until UFC went mainstream and MMA became one of the fastest growing sports in the world, the only martial books you could find where the author examined Boxing, Grappling and Muay Thai and broke down the pros and cons of each individual style and when and how to utilize the respective skills were written by Bruce Lee.
frank shamrock has contributed more to developing the martial arts then bruce lee ever did.. as have many others. but lets not let facts interrupt your bruce lee circlejerk... please continue with my blessing
Frank Shamrock deserves a lot of credit. But ultimately, he was an advocate for optimal physical performance and athleticism. Which by the way, was what Bruce Lee stressed as one of the key ingredients to being a good fighter. I remember in about 2000, Frank was looking to get out of the fight game and wanted to become a full time trainer and was hoping to get a job at Dan Inosanto's academy. He was extremly excited at the possibility. However, the academy already had a shoot wrestling coach (Nakamura) and one of the Machado brothers teaching BJJ. I bring this up because Frank was trying become an instructor at a Jeet Kune Do school.
and thats exactly my point when it comes to lee.. he wasnt the BEST he was just recognised as THE FIRST.. he wasnt some all powerful killing machine with an infinite knowledge of the martial arts. he was just a normal guy who wrote things down.. but when you couple this with his movie star status you get this blown up hyper unrealistic diety of a man and its just rubbish. there are many guys who would have whipped his ass at the time.
Good post Shuges, gonna watch me some UFC 3 this weekend. Ken Shamrock had a system... This content is protected
i dont know how this is relevant in any way to the discussion.. a guy wanted a job at a gym and unfortunately didnt get it.. :conf
OK. I don't recall anybody here ever saying he was the best or hyping him up as a hyper unrealistic deity of a man. All I did, was put Bruce Lee at the top of my list of fighters who made major contributions to MMA and suddenly all of these haterade drinkers started making Lee out to be some kind of a God.
Sorry, man, I have to disagree with this. I think Ken was too scared to do anything against Royce. I don't think it was part of a winning strategy. It's been a long time since I watched UFC VI, but I bet Tank Abbott attempted a lot more of something resembling ground and pound against Taktarov than Ken did against Royce. It would have also been done with a different mindset, something along the lines of trying to win. You know what? All this time I've been crediting Coleman with ground and pound. I was wrong. It was Tank. David "Tank" Abbott = The One True GnP Innovator
the reason for that is because 1# lee wasnt a fighter he was a teacher (who ALLEDGEDLY had a few scuffles) 2# because lee didnt really evolve anything in mma. he espoused virtues that can be broadly taken as wise advice today but when mma got rolling as a sport it was still very much single discipline vs single discipline.
exactly.. thats why i said RECOGNISED as the first.. all thanks to his movie star background and the massive cultural impact his movies left.