Boxers who could maybe do well in MMA

I admit I have watched very little MMA so this might be a silly thread, but oh well. The forums seem pretty slow so who cares?

I'll throw some names out there to get it started...

Who are some boxers who might have a shot of doing well in MMA? Maybe they have a wrestling background or maybe they just seem like, with some additional training, that they'd make a successful transition.

David Tua
Perhaps his solid base would bode well in blocking takedowns? Very solid chin and his boxing abilities would be well above average in MMA. He is said to come from the Anoa'i family of "wrestlers" which is the WWE family line that includes Rocky Johnson, The Rock, Afa and Sika (The Samoans).

Hasim Rahman
We all remember him slamming Lennox Lewis during that one interview. He seems to be very physically strong. He has a lot of natural talent (only 10 ammy fights before turning pro). He has already expressed an interest in crossing over to MMA. Chin might be a little dented by Klit, but has shown the power to equally dent other chins (even knocked Tua down at the end of their last fight) and can you imagine him or Tua hitting someone with those little MMA gloves? At 37 years old he is getting a little long in the tooth.

 

None of them.

Especially both of those guys, they wouldn't even be the best strikers in the division. Washed up Cro Cop would beat both of them.

 

Kinda tough to determine, because without training in any other disciplines, it is impossible to tell how they would do.

There have been many David Tua clones in MMA already. Once it has been figured out that they have an iron chin and hit like a truck, their ground game gets exploited.

 

Or just knocked out by more technical strikers. Which isn't very hard to be more technical than the likes of Tua.

 

Let's not go overboard. Tua had a long amateur career and won a medal in the '92 Olympics. He'd be a much more technical striker than most in MMA.

 

Technical boxer. Not striker.

 

I think the most important attribute is their attitude...they've got to be willing to train very hard and learn new things. They've got to be mentally strong enough to stick at it if they lose an early fight or two.

Physically, i guess the best foundation is to have quick feet and reflexes in order to give the boxer the best chance of avoiding takedowns.

I don't expect much to come from Toney or Mayorga's MMA careers, i can't see them dedicating themselves to the sport....i'd be interested to know more about BJ Flores' background, if there is any martial arts or wrestling in there.

Enzo Maccarinelli has talked about trying MMA....he's a big fan of the sport and does do some JJ on the side....if he caught anyone at 205 it would be lights-out!

 

:: What? He didn't slam Lewis. He pushed Lewis backwards onto a flimsy coffee table which completely collapsed under Lewis' 250lb+ frame. What f*cking slam are people talking about? :notallthere: I never understood this stupid sh*t about Rahman slamming Lewis.

 

Didn't Ray Mercer KO a 2-time UFC champ in Tim Sylvia in like 12 seconds?

 

Mercer also got submitted Kimbo.

 

So does that mean Kimbo > 2 time UFC Champion Tim Sylvia?

 

Nope, it means Sylvia is a retard and played right into Mercers only chance.

 

How about Vitali? Former kickboxer.

 

Wow. His brother fought KJ Noons and Yves Edwards. Pretty cool.

 

I love your rationale.


Does that mean Lyle McDowell > Muhammad Ali? McDowell beat Berbick and Berbick beat Ali.

Again, love that rationale.

Ray Mercer quit in a kick boxing match. Got choked out by Kimbo. But happened to land a big shot on a washed up Tim Sylvia.

Geez.

 

THAT SHIT WAS HILARIOUS! :laughing:

5 seconds in, one head kick later, Mercer goes home.

 

? really

tua would knock out dos santos, velasquez, prime cro cop all within 1 minute of stand up assuming they didnt take him down.

if they did however, he would lose indefinitely.

 

No he fucking wouldn't.

 

Not a chance. I said striking, not boxing. Prime Crocop would have kicked him silly.

 

I was joking.

 

based on what?

maybe not anymore. do you honestly believe the best strikers in the world are NOT in professional boxing?

and even worse, you think they are in mma?

if someone thinks kaoklai can beat jeff lacy, that is there business. but if they think dan hardy can (standing up) thats a whole different story. (and level of stupidity)

mirko cro cop may have been a childhood martial artist, but his earliest goals were in the boxing ring. where he was 20-6 with 3 knockout losses as an amateur. in k1 he was knocked out several times by one punch. and he was knocked out by wrestler kevin randleman. and he would outstrike david tua? idiot.

nick diaz gets battered constantly sparring with rodney jones, yet stopped marius zaromskis (in one round i might add!) a kickboxing world champion.

any top 20 boxer in the world in any weight class, has better striking ability than anybody in mma. save a few elite kickboxers who never did anything in the cage.

 

what is the difference in striking? low kicks?

thai clinch (not legal in k1) throwing (not legal in k1)

striking is not that different. the best kickboxers of all time from peter aerts to ernesto hoost to buakaw to tyrone spong to ramon dekker have all been knocked out (except buakaw) by far lesser boxers than david tua or rahman. with one shot on top of that!

prime hoost gets KOed by prime tua. let alone a prime crocop give me a fucking break. if he was talented enough he wouldve been in the ring, and i dont mean the PRIDE ring.

the only boxers to fight in k1 have been 100 years old (vince phillips, ray mercer, francois botha, mighty mo) and when it comes to mma it is even worse.

ask tito ortiz, who stepped in the ring to box with john david jackson after dissing mma and got knocked out. or frank shamrock, who thinks any eilte boxer with average grappling would dominate mixed martial arts. or fighters like kj noons who rely on boxing although they are not any good at it (comparitively speaking) to beat superior mma "strikers"

 

thai clinch (not legal in k1) throwing (not legal in k1)

Who said anything about K1?

striking is not that different. the best kickboxers of all time from peter aerts to ernesto hoost to buakaw to tyrone spong to ramon dekker have all been knocked out (except buakaw) by far lesser boxers than david tua or rahman. with one shot on top of that!

So who are these boxers that beat these guys?

prime hoost gets KOed by prime tua. let alone a prime crocop give me a fucking break. if he was talented enough he wouldve been in the ring, and i dont mean the PRIDE ring.

This makes no sense at all. Its like saying that if Dale Jr. was talented enough he'd be in Formula 1, or if Ronaldo was talented enough he would be a kicker for the Colts. Gimme a break, Kickboxing/MMA is the path that he chose and he loved it, not boxing.

the only boxers to fight in k1 have been 100 years old (vince phillips, ray mercer, francois botha, mighty mo) and when it comes to mma it is even worse.

Botha was 34, hardly 100. The list is actually much larger than you think. Try doing your homework and you will see that tons of professional boxers have tried kickboxing and MMA out.

ask tito ortiz, who stepped in the ring to box with john david jackson after dissing mma and got knocked out. or frank shamrock, who thinks any eilte boxer with average grappling would dominate mixed martial arts. or fighters like kj noons who rely on boxing although they are not any good at it (comparitively speaking) to beat superior mma "strikers"

Are you seriously using Tito as an example to represent striking in MMA? Seriously? Man you lose all credibility there, son.

 

calling me son does not make me wrong.

botha was knocked out in one round with just punches to mighty mo. lets just drop k1 and talk mma. who would you like for me to use when discussing boxing in mma?

who in your opinion has good hands? the best of all of them? anderson silva (1-1 in pro boxing with a knockout loss) or vitor belfort (lost his only amateur bouts by KO 0-2 with two knockout losses)

you guys point out mercer-kimbo ignoring that mercer thought it was punching only and tapped out before even being in the kimbotine.

crocop did NOT go straight to k-1/PRIDE you are speaking from ignorance. crocop was an amateur heavyweight boxer in his teens and was knocked out 3 times as an amateur ending his hopes. ONLY than did he turn to k-1 and then PRIDE.

james warring did mma. beat legend and pioneer erik paulson. rubin williams came to lose for a payday. injin chi had moderate success in k-1 way out of his weight class after he was no longer good enough to box at a high level. arthur williams fought and got barbecued in his 40s. vince phillips was put in 25 lbs north of his weight class against a prime masato in a brutal beating but had masato covering up and getting bombed on. imo a prime vince beats masato even in k-1. alex emelianenko is an elite mma striker, whose only weakness is that he just uses his hands...and he was just clowned by someone in their pro debut.

i have personally spoke with brandon vera who agreed with me that the reason eilte boxers would lose is not the stand-up, but lack of ground game (which i also believe)

bas rutten. frank mir. frank shamrock. chuck liddell. jens pulver. the list goes on of people who are already on record now that james toney is in the ufc saying noone in the ufc can stand with him period.

junir dos santos regularly is battered in sparring boxing people you have never heard of, only to go out there and KO everybody WITH PUNCHES ONLY.

i just want to know how a weak chinned failed boxer who never won shit in k-1 is a lock to KO an eilte professional boxer. because he can kick? my ass. crocop gets KOed by tua unless he takes him down immediately. so does dos santos, carwin, anderson silva, machida, fedor, etc.

 

great posts, and let's not forget that Botha won vs 2 K-1 legends in Aerts adn Lebanner ( yes I know it was an injury vs Aerts ) and should have won a decision vs Bojansky too. Much better than he ever done in boxing where the closest he came to a meaningfull win was a draw vs Briggs

People who never in trained in boxing and other striking arts, only thinks that boxing is the same as kickboxing or muay thay but while only using punches. Big mistake, it's much more than that and is an art as effective (striking wise) as any other out there. And as the $$$$ is far bigger in boxing than any other striking sport, it's obvious why at least 90% of athletes blessed with striking abilities fight in boxing as opposed to k-1 or mma.

And it's ridiculous how some person think guy's like Penn would take a word class boxer standing, he just lost a striking match to what would generous to described as a D level boxer ( Edgar only used basic boxing to win )

 

sure, he got all he could handled with basically a poor man version of Tua in Hunt ( and don't tell me hunt is nothing more than a boxer, he barely uses kicks ). Tua would wrecked him, crocop,as much a I like him, was a tin man and he wouldn't be able to handle the heat Tua would bring