Murilo Bustamante Talks Greasing in MMA, Mentions Dan Henderson

by bigcherry on Mar 24, 2009 8:01 PM EDT Comment 8 comments

Leader of Brazilian Top Team and ex-UFC Champ, Murilo Bustamente gave a brief interview to Tatame, after his student Maurício Reis lost to Felipe Olivieri last week on the third edition of WOCS that took place in Rio de Janeiro.

During the fight Maurício complained several times to the referee, saying Felipe was greased. The referee called the event promoter who decided to let the fight go on because he couldn’t prove that the slippery was from greasing. Felipe ended up knocking Maurício out on the second round.

Here is what Murilo Bustamente had to say after the fight:

“In a fight between two athletes, one from Muay Thai and the other one from Jiu-Jitsu, its obvious that the use of oils and such gives an unfair advantage to the fighter that would rather keep the fight standing as he will be harder to take down and harder to submit.

An example is the fight between Toquinho and Henderson on the UFC. After the fight Toquinho complained that he had a hard time keeping the american down and that Dan’s legs were too slippery otherwise he wouldn’t have escaped that leg lock.

We (BTT) know that Toquinho wouldn´t made this up, but we were naive at the time bringing that up only after the fight was over. People that are using illegal substances must be punished.”

I have no idea if those allegations are true or what mesures will be taken to mitigate this risk, but i think that

greasing is far more common then we think. Maybe BJ did help the sport after all, intentionally or not, by encouraging people to talk about it and putting the spotlight on the problem.

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the only thing i thought that bj did that was out of line was trying to delay the gsp alves fight, otherwise the more light shed on greasing the better imo

by Epy on Mar 24, 2009 8:25 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I don’t see greasing in the corner during the fight as a big issue. The problem may be with what happens before the fight begins. It will be interesting to see how far promotions and athletic commissions can and are willing to go in clamping down on supposed pre-fight greasing.

by Cannon Jacques on Mar 24, 2009 8:33 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

lol i wrote the wrong name, it is Murilo Bustamante.
Funny how we only see the typos after we posted it.

by bigcherry on Mar 24, 2009 9:30 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Isn't Henderson, the wrestler, going to be difficult for the BJJ specialist Palhares to take down?

I remember the Henderson vs Palhares fight, and I remember Henderson utilizing a great strategy of sprawling and keeping the fight standing. I remember that Palhares had the leg lock and held it, but Henderson managed to pull the leg out in what looked like powering out of it. However, that move happened sometime later in the fight, so it should not be inconceivable that Henderson’s legs were sweaty. I hate to question Palhares’s integrity, but accusing Henderson of greasing sounds more like “sour grapes” for losing. If I recall, Palhares was pretty much dominated in that fight.

by chrisbboy82 on Mar 25, 2009 12:29 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

The Thing Is...

When will an accusation be given merit? When a fighter wins and THEN accuses a fighter of greasing? To me it seems as if Greasing is a bigger issue than anyone is willing to accept, and its mostly because the biggest accusations are against the posterboy that is GSP. Obviously I’m not saying that Hendo greased, but after reading and listening to fighters speak on the subject it seems as if this is fairly common tactic used to gain an advantage, and usually its pride or fear of backlash that stops the fighters from speaking on it.

by Loot on Mar 25, 2009 9:36 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs