5 Most Influencial Names in MMA

by Gogoplatapus on Sep 26, 2008 1:58 PM EDT

Royce Gracie - Obvious reasons. He brought his style of MMA to the masses and you need to be well versed in his particular art to even be considered a fighter nowadays.

Mark Coleman - Also known as the Grandfather of G&P. His style of top position + donkey kong punches is still seen in nearly every fight. He showed wrestlers there is a life after College and its called MMA.

Ken Shamrock - His stint on WWE/F made many, otherwise unaware people, aware there was a real wrestling sport out there.

Randy Couture - He showed people you didn't have to be an uneducated brute, such as Tank Abbot, to do well in this sport. His common man persona with his superhuman skill and perseverance gave hopes to the normal guy.

Tito Ortiz - MMA's first bad boy. The guy you loved to hate. He made it easy for the UFC to start drafting story lines leading up to fights. He brought a voice to fighters you virtually knew nothing about.

Runners-UP

Chuck Liddell - On the list of "most recognizables" hair-do's, he's second only to MJ.

BJ Penn - Size doesn't matter. It's how you use it.

Matt Hughes - (only for ppl in Iowa) Yes, you can become famous too!!

The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Bloody Elbow readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Bloody Elbow editors or staff.

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Sakuraba isn’t even a runner up?

by Epy on Sep 26, 2008 3:03 PM EDT reply actions

Maybe top 20. I don’t think he’s made any waves in MMA as a whole, especially in here in the US. He’s well known to the hardcore community, and maybe 1 out of every 100 casual fans, but he hasn’t been a pivotal piece in moving the MMA world forward.

by Gogoplatapus on Sep 26, 2008 3:34 PM EDT reply actions

Gotta disagree. Sakuraba is a legend and belongs with all of those names. The great thing about mma, is the global appeal and he is a huge part of that.

As much as I’m not a fan, how about Frank Shamrock? One of the first well rounded guys in mma. I would call that pretty influential. Not trying to disagree with you, just a suggestion.

"The bigger the cushion, the sweeter the pushin'"

by BJJDenver on Sep 26, 2008 3:39 PM EDT up reply actions

“Maybe top 20.”

….

Seriously?

This is a somewhat decent list for American MMA but to absolutely neglect the rest of the entire world is beyond ignorant. According to this list there was no significant influence in all of Asia or even Brazil.
And Royce didn’t even have any “mixed” martial art to show the masses. Unless you consider a fake kick to set up a shot “kickboxing.”

by Simco on Sep 26, 2008 4:39 PM EDT up reply actions

and how about Bas???

He’s Dutch!

by mythbuster on Sep 26, 2008 5:02 PM EDT up reply actions

If you’re not Dutch, you’re not much! lol

"The bigger the cushion, the sweeter the pushin'"

by BJJDenver on Sep 26, 2008 11:52 PM EDT up reply actions

haha, that killed me the other night. Bas was obviously tanked about midway through the show.

by Chris Nelson on Sep 27, 2008 12:00 AM EDT up reply actions

I think this should be titled “5 Most Influencial Fighters in MMA” In your talking “Names” you would have to include someone like Dana White, of whom I’m no fan.

As far as fighters go, I really like your first two, but I think it starts to dwindle after that. What about somoene like Maurice Smith? Didn’t he introduce the sprawl and brwal defense against the wrestlers like Coleman?

I wonder if next year yo’ll have to add Kimbo to this list (shudder).

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MMA Ratings

by kamander on Sep 26, 2008 5:27 PM EDT reply actions