Jim Judy -

I'm not playing with you.

You were warned. Change your method, manner and show some respect bro.

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Yeah, thank God!

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Yes, thank God that strikers were given a chance. Yes. They SHOULD be thankful. I agree.


-John

In all fairness the Gracies and Brazilians had fought that way for 50-40 years. Knowing what and how an opponent will fight means alot. You know what they are capable of doing having trained against it in the dojo in contact matches before.

Not taking anything from skinning Royce (leg muscles of steel) beating Giants like Kimo (had Judo some background) along with his striking, Grapplers Seversen and Pancrase's Shamrock. What about the big Dutch JJ guy he beat him pretty handedly, outweighed by at least 60lbs? But at the time BJJ was superior because Royce had trained more realistic and against better quailty opponent his older brothers, cousins and Uncles were awesome. Thats what made it looks so smooth as if he's done it or had it done to him numerous times, because he had.

Whatever made grappling fall to the way side, its back now on the fore burner, and have people thinking about using it as the favorite against a close in weapon like a knife. Filipinos and Inodoasains arts use weapon intensively there are some ground defense but predominately they defend standing and mobile. What does this mean? Only that I've only seen a limit amount of skilled people defend against a knife on the ground as the place to be. Now if you are there its best to have trained it, tying in Royce experince with his muscluar opponents.

Theres no doubt you need both skills to be well rounded.

Note that after Seversen and Kimo fight he had to be packed off. Still I can't take anything away from his skill and tenacity, heritage means something when it comes to willing yourself to do it for more then just you.

To others that just started training in ground work, know your strength don't go to the ground because its done in the UFC/MMA. If you do a takedown and the guy a better grappler and has a hold of you escape after realizing hes better is unlikely. You probably going get the crap beat out out of you. Standing you always got a strikers chance, slim as it might be pending your or the oponents skill level.

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Not taking anything from skinning Royce (leg muscles of steel) beating Giants like Kimo

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I hate the irony of a grappler beating a Kimo

But that said, I do have a big post to make on this thread, I am tied up with work, but soon when I have time I will respond to the question asked why I think ground fighting fell to the wayside.

Been a good thread though and I have been reading along, lots of good comments, lots of silly internet BS too.

So why do I think ground fighting fell by the wayside?

I think there are many possible reasons but my hunch is this.

Martial Arts is like magic. Magic is no longer magical once you understand the trick. Martial Arts is much the same way, "Karate is my secret" it works so well because the other guy doesn't know what is coming or how to combat it.

In a time where everyone learned wrestling but few learned striking, the striker was magical.

In the UFC it was the same thing, Grapplers won because they had "secret" fighting tools the strikers did not.

So you can see how things might evolve.

Today a lot of the secret aspects are gone, so many people know MA it's like we can all see behind the curtain, so MA has gone from being like magic to being like sports.

Truth be told though, good MA is still magic to the average guy walking down the street, maybe today because of the information age you need to be better then you had to be in the past, but the stuff still works.

Martial Arts is about knowing something the other guy, or guys do not, thats why it works so well and so fast.

Martial Arts is not about 2 evenly matched and trained fighters in combat, thats sports.

So ground fighting went to the wayside because it was largely uneeded and dangerous, some grappling remained because it had more value for the situations people of the time faced.

Then it was passed down in that form, even if that form no longer met the challenges of new generations.

Just my thoughts.

So ground fighting went by the wayside even though it never went by the wayside.

Is that a fair statement?


-John

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So ground fighting went by the wayside even though it never went by the wayside.

Is that a fair statement?

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Oh you do love the double talk John.

Ground fighting as an art never went away, the arts moved away and then reconverged.

Kimo -

As cxt and others have noted, within the karate tradition at least, it is fair to say that groundfighting was never taught in an integrated fashion. This begs the question of it "falling by the wayside", since they were never really together in the first place.

Does anyone have any evidence that groundfighting and striking were taught together in a widespread manner anywhere in the 20th century? Seems to me that it was fairly rare, but a historian I'm not.

Matt,

"Does anyone have any evidence that groundfighting and striking were taught together in a widespread manner anywhere in the 20th century? Seems to me that it was fairly rare, but a historian I'm not."

I don't think so in the karate tradition. Other traditions such as many of the Northern Chinese systems, or the Indonesian silat systems have always integrated ground and striking traditions.