Well It has been awhile since Machida won the belt, but I coudln't help smiling when he yelled, "Karate is back!" I remember thinking Lyoto is a testament to everything I have been preaching about for the future of MMA. It just took me this long to get off my lazy butt and write this article.
I had said that fighters that have been training in martial arts since they were a child would come to the sport with something different and effectives. They would not be coming in at their 20s learning the basic Muay Thai, Wrestling, and BJJ.
These kids will have been training in something like Aikido or Kalarippayattu since they were kids and they will adapt it to work well in a Cage.
For the longest time everyone has been saying, the reason you don't see any other forms of Martial arts in MMA is because they are in in-effective and useless. There is no way that someone who has learned such an odd form of fighting would ever survive in a ring.
Well Lyoto, someone who has been training in Karate all his life, a sport that many had labeled useless since the more sport oriented martial arts fighters seemed to steam roll over them, came in and dominated in all his fights keeping a perfect record.
If Lyoto could adapt his traditional Karate to work in the ring and excel at it, what is stopping someone who has trained in something like Ninjitsu to do the same and adapt his skills to work in the cage.
I still believe that MMA will get to the point where fighters will not only be good at three basic styles, but several styles, and some of them way out there in nature.
8 Comments
Loading more comments...
This comment and all replies have been deleted This comment has been deleted Undo delete