Frank Shamrock: Time To Focus Less on the Legend, More on the Legacy

It’s been just over six years since the first time I saw Frank Shamrock fight live in person, in what wound up being one of several comebacks for the former UFC middleweight king. That day I made the three hour trek from the Bay Area to Lemoore, California, where I hoped to see Shamrock in a triumphant return against a journeyman by the name of Brian Pardoe.

That night, he did not disappoint.

The card was WEC 6: Return of a Legend (pre-Zuffa ownership), and while it featured quite a few (then) up-and-comers and current or future UFC veterans, the focus was overwhelmingly on Shamrock’s return to the cage after a three-year layoff. Among those fighting on the undercard was a 20-year-old kid who was quickly making a name for himself in jiu-jitsu and MMA circles throughout California: Nick Diaz.

If you would have told me then that the skinny Cesar Gracie-protege, who barely looked old enough to drive at the time, would wind up being the adversary that would one day expose Shamrock as well past his prime, I likely would have been too busy laughing to even reply.

It’s not that Diaz wasn’t already an impressive talent in the cage. That night he won the WEC welterweight title, ironically by beating Shamrock’s former Lion’s Den stable mate Joe Hurley, who was one of the original young stars on the West Coast when MMA was evolving into a legitimate sport.

But while I had my suspicions that perhaps Shamrock wasn’t quite the dominant fighter he built himself up to be, it would have been hard to imagine the young welterweight Diaz ever beating the champion that had conquered the UFC in such swift fashion and left the promotion under the guise of having “run out of people to fight.”

Putting so much stock in Frank Shamrock isn’t so much the mistake, as doubting Nick Diaz is.

It was on this site last week where I opined that Diaz could win their Strikeforce tilt, speculating that being the better wrestler would be in his best interests. My prediction however was Shamrock using the clock and scorecards to his advantage and winning a lackluster decision.

Sometimes it’s great to be wrong.

Unlike the night six years ago when I was cageside to support Shamrock in his quest to show he was still relevant in MMA, last night I didn’t have a rooting interest either way, other than to see a good fight—and Diaz delivered.

But watching him pick Shamrock apart before finally pummeling him into a referee stoppage, it became clear that it’s time for fans to reflect less on Shamrock as a legend, and more on the legacy he has created in MMA.

Shamrock is definitely not the fighter he was 10 years ago, six years ago, probably not even a single year ago. Injuries have changed his fighting style vastly, forcing him into the roll of striker, and a shell of the submission-wizard he once was.

The bottom line is Shamrock ran into a fighter that was better than him last night, and likely would have handled him even when he was in his prime.

Character issues aside, what you get from Nick Diaz is a complete fighter; a truly professional athlete that relies on his boxing as much as he does his core style of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

In fact, when Diaz is in the cage plying his craft, he is one of the best examples the sport has of what a complete fighter is capable of. His conditioning never fails, he can finish the fight anyway possible and he never takes a split second off.

Diaz is the byproduct of the evolution of MMA from style vs. style to professional athlete—the standard set by Frank Shamrock.

It’s debatable these days as to where Shamrock fits among the truly elite in MMA. To hear him speak he is to MMA what Muhammad Ali was to boxing, what Jim Brown was to football. Of course, in his own words he also runs the greatest MMA training center in the world despite his IFL team having never won a team competition.

But while he’s been a shining example of how valuable self-promotion and story-telling can be in MMA, he’s also been the original example of why an MMA fighter needs to be diverse and complete. Like all fighters, he came from one original fighting style, but never stopped striving for complete excellence in the combat arts. He showed the world what cross-training and conditioning could do when combined with natural talent and an abundance of heart.

Can he honestly claim the kind of record or accomplishments of Randy Couture or Anderson Silva? Probably not. Can he still compete with the very elite in MMA these days? Nick Diaz put that speculation to rest in rather startling fashion last night.

When Shamrock picks himself up and recovers from the most lopsided of his ten career losses, he’ll have his most disappointing performance to reflect on. But while he does so, he can also reflect on the fact that the beating he took from Diaz is in large part due to his own contributions to MMA.

And for that, Shamrock can hold his head high.