White Shogun
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Fox Sports Network will be airing Pride Fighting tonight and throughout the week. Its on at 10 PM Central time, check your local listings.
Pride
- Thread starter White Shogun
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White_Savage
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I watched some PRIDE yesterday.
I think their HW division may be stronger than the UFCs, what with Fedor and CroCop.
The LW/Middleweight division I'm not so sure of. Silva is the top man there, like to see him take on Iceman or Couture. He is effectively White, of course.
Then again, it seems to me alot of also-rans from UFC are fighting in PRIDE, so the competition over all may not be as stiff. Any thoughts on this Shogun?
PRIDE rules are of course superior in that they allow things UFC bans, like knees/kicks to the head of a downed man. Another question for Shogun, do they still allow head-butts? Also, I believe the Japanese are more appreciative of grappling and not as quick to stand a fight back up. The 10 minute first round is an interesting idea and quite possibly wortwhile. I don't know about the ring-I just naturally like the unique octagon, with it's greater room and all. OTOH, the ring is probably gives a better view to live spectators, and rings are certainly more common than octagons. Some people argue that the ring makes the sport seem less "barbaric" to the public, but MMA is MMA in a ring or a cage, and only illogical bed-wetters ought to be affected by the choice of enclosure.
I think their HW division may be stronger than the UFCs, what with Fedor and CroCop.
The LW/Middleweight division I'm not so sure of. Silva is the top man there, like to see him take on Iceman or Couture. He is effectively White, of course.
Then again, it seems to me alot of also-rans from UFC are fighting in PRIDE, so the competition over all may not be as stiff. Any thoughts on this Shogun?
PRIDE rules are of course superior in that they allow things UFC bans, like knees/kicks to the head of a downed man. Another question for Shogun, do they still allow head-butts? Also, I believe the Japanese are more appreciative of grappling and not as quick to stand a fight back up. The 10 minute first round is an interesting idea and quite possibly wortwhile. I don't know about the ring-I just naturally like the unique octagon, with it's greater room and all. OTOH, the ring is probably gives a better view to live spectators, and rings are certainly more common than octagons. Some people argue that the ring makes the sport seem less "barbaric" to the public, but MMA is MMA in a ring or a cage, and only illogical bed-wetters ought to be affected by the choice of enclosure.
White Shogun
Hall of Famer
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I watched some of the Pride telecast, too. I switched between that and the UFC replays on Spike. One thing is certain, if Pride wants anyone to watch that show regularly, who is not a hard core MMA fan, they need to dump the dufus yakking before the fights and make a show out of it. Quality of fighters may vary but the UFC puts on a better show, hands down.
Wanderlai Silva is a beast. His KO of Sakuraba was down right scary. That wasn't some punk kid he knocked out so viciously, that was Sakuraba!
If you look through the Pride stable of fighters, half of them read like a UFC Hall of Fame Ballot. Mark Coleman, Don Frye, Tank Abbott?? They have Randleman, Goodridge, and Vernon White, too, if that means anything. I think most of it has to do with pay and behind the scenes politics more than anything else. But the Pride product isn't hyped and televised enough to attract many non-MMA viewers, and UFC IMO scored a major coup with TUF and live fights on Spike TV.
I don't know about the head butts. I haven't seen anybody use one in a while, so they are probably banned. Watching the PPV UFC this past weekend, you can really tell how the rules changes have affected the tactics and techniques of the fights. No way the fighter on the bottom stays turtled if he is taking knees to the head. Couture would have killed Van Arsdale if they still allowed that shot; all Randy did instead was throw a couple knees to his shoulders.
As I understand it, you can't even use elbows anymore, but only 'forearm' shots. Is that right, Savage?
I prefer the cage to the ring, there is actually a strategy to cage fighting that can't be applied in a ring. You'll fall out into the audience.
Wanderlai Silva is a beast. His KO of Sakuraba was down right scary. That wasn't some punk kid he knocked out so viciously, that was Sakuraba!
If you look through the Pride stable of fighters, half of them read like a UFC Hall of Fame Ballot. Mark Coleman, Don Frye, Tank Abbott?? They have Randleman, Goodridge, and Vernon White, too, if that means anything. I think most of it has to do with pay and behind the scenes politics more than anything else. But the Pride product isn't hyped and televised enough to attract many non-MMA viewers, and UFC IMO scored a major coup with TUF and live fights on Spike TV.
I don't know about the head butts. I haven't seen anybody use one in a while, so they are probably banned. Watching the PPV UFC this past weekend, you can really tell how the rules changes have affected the tactics and techniques of the fights. No way the fighter on the bottom stays turtled if he is taking knees to the head. Couture would have killed Van Arsdale if they still allowed that shot; all Randy did instead was throw a couple knees to his shoulders.
As I understand it, you can't even use elbows anymore, but only 'forearm' shots. Is that right, Savage?
I prefer the cage to the ring, there is actually a strategy to cage fighting that can't be applied in a ring. You'll fall out into the audience.
White_Savage
Mentor
Apparently the Japs like the ******* fighters, then again, they DO have sense enough to keep their country 98% Japanese. I mean Goodrich and White, certainly washouts, can there be any doubt that Jackson's win over Liddell was anything but a fluke?