Why can GSP so easily takedown these great wrestlers?

St. Pierre puts on master class as he steps closer to regaining UFC crown

By Neil Davidson, THE CANADIAN PRESS




Matt Hughes, bottom, is pinned by Georges St. Pierre, of Montreal, Canada, during the first round of their welterweight bout at UFC 79 at the Mandalay Bay hotel and casino in Las Vegas, Saturday. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Jae C. Hong

LAS VEGAS - Canadian Georges St. Pierre showed his class in moving a step closer to regaining his UFC welterweight title. Chuck (The Iceman) Liddell demonstrated he can still bang. And Wanderlei (The Axe Murderer) Silva proved he can take a beating and keep throwing.

All three put on a show as the co-main events did not disappoint at UFC 79: Nemesis on Saturday night.

St. Pierre dominated Matt Hughes in their rubber match en route to a second-round submission and the interim 170-pound championship, outwrestling Hughes to beat the former two-time welterweight champion at his own game.


St. Pierre, meanwhile, put on a masterful performance in dominating a fighter seen as the sport's greatest ever welterweight champion. But at 34, Hughes' better days seem behind him - at least when he steps in against the Canadian. If he can keep his head screwed on right, St. Pierre (15-2) is the present - and future of the sport.

"I think Georges St. Pierre has the potential to be the greatest 170-pounder ever," said trainer Greg Jackson. "He's just phenomenal. The scary thing is he keeps getting better."

The 26-year-old from Montreal will now meet current title-holder Matt Serra, providing Serra can recover from the back injury that forced him to sit out UFC 79. If all goes according to plan, St. Pierre will fight Serra to decide the title for real in Montreal on April 19 at the Bell Centre in the UFC's first foray north of the border.

White sees Canada as fertile ground for his brand of mixed martial arts, given its pay-per-view numbers and Canadian ticket sales for U.S. events.

"It's insane how big this sport is in Canada, and especially how many Canadians come down here, whether Georges St. Pierre is fighting or not," he told the post-fight news conference. "The sport is so big in Canada, it's mind-boggling to me."

MMA, however, has yet to receive government sanctioning approval in Ontario, however.

St. Pierre-Hughes closed out the evening but Liddell-Silva stole the show, with fans - including light-heavyweight champion Quinton (Rampage) Jackson and middleweight title-holder Anderson (The Spider) Silva - on their feet and screaming throughout the bout.


Hughes came out as a southpaw, a former wrestling strategy he said his camp had initially devised to combat Serra's right hand. It didn't work against St. Pierre, who had his way with the two-time champion.

St. Pierre won in style, ending the bout with a slick move, taking Hughes down with a nifty judo throw and then outmanoeuvring Hughes to slap on an armbar. Hughes (43-6) submitted verbally at 4:54 of the second round.

Hughes submitted St. Pierre at UFC 50 in October 2004 to win the vacant title. St. Pierre took it away from him in November 2006 at UFC 65, only to lose to Serra in a shocking upset in his first title defence at UFC 69 in April.

St. Pierre dominated the first round this time, stuffing a Hughes takedown attempt and then taking Hughes down two minutes in. The Canadian spent the rest of the round on top, taking the mount position as the round ended.

There was another St. Pierre takedown to open the second before he finished off Hughes, who had nothing in his toolbox to stop his opponent.

The one-sided fight has Hughes rethinking his fighting future.

"I'm not going to come out here and be someone's highlight reel. That's not for me," said Hughes, who defended the title nine times when he was champion. "I've got to go back and think about things . . . I really came in this fight in shape, with a good game plan. I just never got it really rolling."

St. Pierre, who sported the fleur-de-lis on his blue trunks to match the tattoo on his calf, celebrated by break dancing in the middle of the ring. The Quebec symbol was his manager's idea after a sponsor withdrew, leaving a free space on his tight shorts.

St. Pierre, his face showing only traces he had been in a fight, looked just as slick after the fight in an Armani suit and open-necked dress shirt as he sat next to a battered Hughes, whose left eye was discoloured and swollen.

The Canadian is the poster boy for the new breed of mixed martial artist, equally adept at the sport's many disciplines. He trains with world champion boxer Joachim Alcine back home in Montreal and only put aside a bid to make the Canadian Olympic wrestling team when the Hughes fight conflicted with the Olympic trials.
Serra upset an unfocused and ill-prepared St. Pierre in April at UFC 69 in the Canadian's first title defence when family illness, poor training and injuries took their toll. St. Pierre was all business Saturday, however, and says he has learned from past mistakes.

"He is very hungry for Matt Serra. Very hungry, said Jackson.

"They're going to see the difference in my eyes when I get in the ring," echoed St. Pierre.

No fan of Serra after their stint as rival coaches on "The Ultimate Fighter," Hughes has no doubt about the outcome of a St. Pierre-Serra rematch.

"When Georges and him match up, I think it's going to be a different fight. And Matt Serra's going to go down that ladder just as quick as he happened to pop up that ladder."

Notes: UFC matchmaker Joe Silva said he did not even consider calling Georges St. Pierre when Matt Serra pulled out of UFC 79 through injury, reasoning St. Pierre had no reason to take such a bout on short notice when he had already been promised a championship fight in Canada. Silva said Josh Koscheck and Thiago Silva both agreed to step in for Serra but then St. Pierre's manager phoned to say the Canadian would take the fight ... UFC president Dana White said light-heavyweight champion Quinton (Rampage) Jackson will take on Forrest Griffin next while Tim Sylvia will meet Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira for the interim heavyweight title in February. ... St. Pierre may be one step away from winning a world title for a second time but he says he still has yet to find a Canadian sponsor. "All my sponsors are American," said St. Pierre, adding the sport is far bigger in English Canada than French Canada. ... Nate Mohr may have suffered knee damage in his submission loss to Manny Gamburyan ... James (The Sandman) Irvin was the one put to sleep after taking an illegal knee to the head from Luiz Cane. A dazed Irvin won the fight by disqualification when he couldn't continue, joining the UFC 79 procession to hospital. It was Irvin's first fight since tearing knee ligaments in a loss to Thiago Silva at UFC 71 in May

 

I deleted some of the article because it was too long. Here is the link:
http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Fighting/News/2007/12/30/4746098-cp.html

3 Questions:

1. Why would you think Georges St. Pierre would try out for the Olympics if he was having no success against his Olympic training partners and couldn't compete with them in REAL wrestling?

2. If he was competitive with the best wrestlers in canada, then do you think he could be competitive and possibly outwrestle Kos?

3. Was this part of the UFCs conspiracy to build up his wrestling and promote him?

 

I am not going to bother with you on this subject anymore. It is a waste of time. You will never understand, because you aren't willing to be wrong on an issue. Sometimes, you are just wrong, man. You are arguing your way into a hole, and you have said nothing. You have nothing to back your statements up other than "training rumors", "they say that his training partner says", "this guys plays good basketball", and "he is a better athlete". I mean... wtf are you going on for? This argument ends at the fact that no man, NO MAN, is going to step on the mat, for his first wrestling match, and compete with someone who has made it to the highest level in that sport.

For ****'s sake, KOS wouldn't even be taking those sloppy ass shots in a real wrestling match. He wouldn't have to shoot from 8 feet away because he is too afraid to get close because of the standup. He wouldn't have to go for the same sort of takedown all of the time, because he is afraid to land out of position. He wouldn't be throwing leg kicks, and blocking punches, getting himself out of position. Forget it... some people will simply never want to learn the truth. You keep bringing up examples of people who COMPETED in the sport, and were able to excel at a fast rate... no ****... THEY WERE COMPETING! There are a lot of great athletes who can excel faster than others. What's your point? I bet that KOS, being the great athlete that he is, was able to excel fast in wrestling as well... and THEN HE KEPT PRACTICING AND COMPETING HIS ENTIRE LIFE AND GOT BETTER AND BETTER. On the other hand, you have GSP, who practices wrestling for a couple hours a day, and has never competed in his life. If GSP started competing, and learning from his experience, he may become great fast.... but it sure as hell isn't going to happen in his first match, against a man who was at the top of the heap. Sorry. Do you think that little leg snatches that GSP was doing in those fights would work against a top wrestler, who was in a wrestlers stance, prepared for a takedown?:rofl If so, you clearly need to step back and try to learn something.

Other than that... as I said, I am done with this convo, as far as responding to the same questions over and over from you... Obviously, you are way too far up GSP's ass. I really like the guy, but you are going overboard. It isn't good enough for you that I consider him one of the top pd 4 pd fighters in the world.... he has to be considered one of the best wrestlers on the planet too... since he took down some wrestlers in an MMA fight, and during the UFC hype, they say that his training partners think he is very good. Nevermind the fact that he has never wrestled a single match.atsch Yet, when he gets hit and knocked out, he is still a better striker than that person... striking is just "different". Your logic is all screwed up.


I will leave it as this...

KOS is a much better wrestler than GSP. GSP was able to take him down, because it was an MMA fight, not a wrestling match. KOS has to respect GSP too much on his feet, and can't commit to the wrestling game against him. GSP was able to hold him down on his back... because once again, this is not a wrestling match.

GSP is a better striker than Serra. Serra was able to knock GSP out, because GSP was too concerned with Serra's ground game, and was much more worried about going to the ground, than he was getting hit. GSP felt that he didn't have to worry about the stand up game, just like KOS felt like he didn't have to worry about GSP taking him down.

Both KOS and GSP got reality checks that you have to respect a man in every aspect of the game... and that even if you are a much better wrestler, the other guy can take you down in an MMA fight.... even if you are a better striker, the other guy can knock you out. Simple as that.

 

Considering he hasn't even entered any of the qualifying tournaments, I would take that with a grain of salt.

Tito isn't a better wrestler than Matyushenko
Bustamante isn't a better wrestler than Lindland
GSP isn't a better wrestler than Kos.

 

New chapter in St. Pierre-Hughes thriller

By Dave Meltzer, Yahoo! Sports
December 24, 2007


When Matt Hughes was given a series of options over Thanksgiving weekend for his next move after a back injury put Ultimate Fighting Championship welterweight champion Matt Serra on the shelf, he chose the toughest opponent, Georges St. Pierre, who is generally considered the most talented fighter in the world at his weight.

Of course, there was a method to his madness. Hughes, the two-time former champion, figured St. Pierre, who wasn't expected to fight again until April, wouldn't be in top shape. He also pushed for, and got the match as an interim title match on Saturday night at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas for UFC's final – and arguably biggest – pay-per-view event of 2007. The title stipulation meant five rounds instead of three, where conditioning would play more of a factor.



But in talking with St. Pierre, you get the indication the usually well-calculated Hughes' attempt to play the percentages may not pay off.

"I had the best training camp of my life," said St. Pierre, 26, who tries to regain the title he lost to Serra on April 7 in Houston, in arguably the biggest surprise in a year full of surprises in the UFC. "Even though I took the fight on short notice, I will be the best Georges St. Pierre ever, the sharpest ever and the strongest ever."

St. Pierre trained with the top wrestlers in Canada, who were peaking for their Olympic trials, two championship-level boxers, as well as bringing people like Rashad Evans and trainer Greg Jackson into his hometown of Montreal for the past few weeks.

Hughes figured St. Pierre would have been resting and taking time off from heavy training, but St. Pierre had been working with Evans to get him ready for his Nov. 17 fight with Michael Bisping, and was in the most intense wrestling training of his life.
St. Pierre said in the back of his mind he was thinking Hughes or Serra could get hurt, and he'd be called to step in, and he was actually training for competition. St. Pierre was seriously considering entering the Canadian Olympic wrestling trials, that took place Dec. 13-16 in Etobicoke, Ont.

In his wrestling training, St. Pierre’s partners had been encouraging him to give the Olympics a go, particularly after he outwrestled Josh Koscheck, a former NCAA Division 1 champion, in his last MMA match on Aug. 25 in Las Vegas, winning a decision. St. Pierre has never competed in wrestling, but has used his wrestling to dominate the takedown aspect of the game with strong wrestlers like Koscheck, Sean Sherk and Frank Trigg in UFC competition. He grew up doing Kyokushin karate, and didn't start wrestling until 2001 when he started switching his attention to MMA, which had a strong local promotion, the UCC (now called TKO), which operated out of Montreal.

In his November 18, 2006, title win over Hughes in Sacramento, Calif., Hughes, a two-time All-American wrestler who has used wrestling as his base to be generally considered the best MMA welterweight fighter in history, was unable to take St. Pierre down. Hughes was dominated standing, en route to be being stopped with a head kick at 1:25 of the second round.

"Everyone underestimates my wrestling ability," St. Pierre said. "I'm not saying I would have won (the Olympic trials), but I think I would have done well in it."

In fact, in the buildup for the Koscheck match, people were in disbelief when St. Pierre claimed ahead of time he was the better wrestler of the two and would prove it in the fight. Based not just on credentials, but on his takedown ability shown in prior fights, Koscheck was considered the best wrestler in the UFC. But St. Pierre exploded with a first-round takedown that shocked almost everyone. And it was winning what was essentially a third-round wrestling battle that clinched his winning the decision that put him next in line after Hughes for the shot at Serra's title. When the fight was over, Koscheck, still in disbelief, said the lesson he learned was that he had to work harder on his wrestling.

"I wasn't that surprised," said Hughes about St. Pierre outwrestling Koscheck in that match. "If they were to go on the mat in a wrestling match, Josh would kill him. But this is mixing of sports and Georges does that very well, and Josh doesn't do it as well."

There has been very little bad blood between the two leading up to the fight, a 180-degree contrast to the previously planned Hughes vs. Serra match.

Given Hughes' combative and competitive personality, that's something of a surprise in the third meeting between the two, with each holding a decisive and relatively quick win.

If there was anything Hughes has said that St. Pierre wanted to respond to, it was the statement that Koscheck would kill him in a wrestling match, as he felt Hughes is one of those people not giving his wrestling the credit it deserves. St. Pierre noted he wouldn't be afraid at all to face Koscheck in a pure wrestling match.

Although he had not discussed the idea with UFC President Dana White, St. Pierre envisioned that if he qualified for the Olympic team, he'd have told White how this publicity could help UFC during an Olympic year. But he said his job and primary goal is being a fighter. When he learned of Serra's injury, he immediately contacted UFC, which was actually thinking in a different direction, figuring St. Pierre wouldn't take the fight on short notice with his guaranteed title shot tentatively scheduled for April.

White had been trying to arrange a show at the Bell Centre in Montreal for more than a year, as St. Pierre headlining the first UFC event in Montreal was the perfect scenario for the first live event in Canada. A St. Pierre vs. Hughes rematch in Montreal was the plan for last spring or summer, but St. Pierre's shocking loss to Serra derailed it.

 

No answer huh?


Is this all publicity? Answer me this then. How would it look publicly if GSP did this and got dominated and embarassed? Maybe he didn't think about that. Or maybe he did and so did his training partners and they decided that he had a good shot at making it?

Every bit of evidence is saying that GSP could be competitive at least in a wrestling match with Kos. But you say he will be destroyed based off a "but......you don't understand" and "your ignorant...." atsch

 

There are much more instances of great strikers getting KO'd by lesser strikers then Great Wrestlers getting manhandled by lesser wreslters. And the reasons are in my above post. Make one mistake in striking and your asleep. Make one mistake in wrestling and your on bottom position.

 

I love how Matt Hughes said exactly what I am trying to say, in that article that you posted.

I think this is the same thing that we have been telling you over and over. Seems like some people know what they are talking about, and some don't.

This is funny.

 

Did you miss the most telling part of that article?

"St. Pierre has never competed in wrestling"

You're telling me how good somebody is when not only have you never seen them compete, they have never competed period.

I'm telling you somebody who went undefeated and won the most prestigious title possible for a particular sport is going to beat somebody who has never competed a single time in his life.

If GSP was at all serious about making the olympics you think he would be entering tournaments like Kid Yamamoto did when he tried to make a run in competitive wrestling again.

 

You just gave yourself the answer. And once on their backs... most wrestlers (unless they also happen to have a good JJ backround) are completely out of their element.

 

And the olympic wrestlers who have actually wrestled with him??? Were they encouraging him to try out for the olympics for a practical joke?

Why didn't you address the question about a guy with 1yr experienc in BJJ beating, dominating guys who have done it their entire lives???? You may say basketball is less complex then wrestling but BJJ sure as dog**** isn't :deal Maybe because some athletes defy the norm?

 

Why? He has the best wrestlers in nthe country at his disposal. Why does he need to join tournaments if he can wrestle full matches with guys already on the team and with olympic experience. Say what you will but constant training with OLYMPIC WRESTLERS is much more beneficial then winning some tournaments :deal

 

Nobody with 1 year BJJ is ever going to beat Jacare or Roger Gracie in a Gi, in a BJJ match.

They might outgrapple them in MMA though.

Concept sounds familiar

 

A) BECAUSE HE NEEDS TO QUALIFY!!! You don't just show up and join the olympic team with your word, you need to meet certain criteria. It's not an option, you NEED to do tournaments to enter the olympics, its basically telling me that he never intended to enter the olympics; this isn't optional.

B) You want match experience, real live match experience.

 

Matt Hughes does have and agenda and it is in his best interest to say this. He is an arrogant wrestler like you, and wants to keep the illusion that what he has done in wrestling solifies his stance as a better wrestler then anyone that hasn't accomplished what he has. You know what. At the time Kos was an all american, he may not have even been the best college wrestling talent at his weight, believe that. There might have been some dude out there into partying and not verry focused who just didn't put 100% in....but if he had he would have whooped him. You speak in absolutes way too much. "This has to be true, because of this....".......:deal