Quote:
Originally Posted by Lakehead
Royce Gracie - First UFC champ, brought BJJ to the world, etc.
Sakuraba - Ran the Gracie family out of MMA. Ended their dominance of the sport.
Wanderlei - Ended Sakuraba's reign of terror, gave the fans the most exciting fights we could hope for
Tito Ortiz - Carried the UFC on his back during the dark ages of MMA. Was the critical man between the old UFC and the new UFC. Saved MMA in North America for the foreseeable future.
Fedor - He's the best. There's never been anyone like him.
5 is a short list, but as far as "most influential" I would have to say that is the list.
BJ Penn, Chuck, Randy, Bas, Frank Shamrock and Hughes are all important as well and deserve a mention. GSP maybe in the future.
|
Everyone is saying Chuck and Randy and I didn't include them and I want to justify that:
The thing about Chuck and Randy is that their influence is primairly based on their being the first coaches on TUF, and that helped bring the UFC and MMA into a new era in North America, but if your going to mention them and include them in a top 5 list, you have to rember how important the Forrest Griffin v Stephan Bonner fight was.
That fight brought the casual fan to MMA, at least in my experience. Everyone around me that didn't give a shit about Pride or UFC, like I couldn't convince them to watch Wanderlei for the life of me, but after that fight all of a sudden these people were into MMA and hooked on TUF, etc.
Not that Randy and Chuck and their feud wasn't influential in it's own right, but their rivalry would not have alerted the sport and meant as much without TUF, IMO.
