
Originally Posted by
Aiseop
It would have been "assimilated" into GJJ somehow; that they've never been against it, just that you don't use it to begin with, but that when someone like Josh comes at you with his size and his forward-weight from your guard it's a good technique. That Grandfather Helio used to do it against old Luta Livre fighters in the 1950s all the time.
I agree. You hear people all the time
swear that the philosophy
they practice is the only thing that matters. I don't feel a truly open minded fighter would base their game around
just 10th planet specific techniques, or
just Gracie Jiu Jitsu, or
just catch wrestling or sambo, but rather would look to blend philosophies and take the best and what they like of each. You could sense the level of respect Josh had for Ryron in his interview after the fight. I liked this match a lot cuz it showed two totally different styles and how they can actually have some effectiveness against each other, though by neglecting another different style (Ryron's case with 10th planet) we saw a limitation in his game, despite the fact that he's a high, high level GJJ practitioner (i.e. a self-defense specialist) and held his own for a spell. For this reason, I love training at 10th planet cuz you can bring whatever style you dig to the table, and if it's effective, you're not gonna be, like, yelled at for using it. If it could be of benefit to people, then your rolls and training partners could all be mutually beneficial relationships. My goal is to hopefully develop a style that's a mega-hybrid beastly amalgamation of styles; dangerous from anywhere, scary guard (closed, open, half, rubber, spiral,
you name it) and a
lot of paths, ruthless top game, great on the feet, solid judo and wrestling, devastating leg locks, great in gi and no gi, ridiculous recovery, all built on a base of having unreal GJJ style self-defense in worst case scenarios. I think one thing that makes Anderson Silva so dangerous or a lot of these really high-level elite MMA fighters are the ones that have black belts in multiple disciplines, then you see them fight and realize they've blended a lot of styles and basically create an entirely
new style just based off their effectiveness. Royce was no wrestling or sambo expert, he just knew GJJ. It was good enough to win the UFC then, but the fight vs. Ryron and Barnett showed that there has to be added layers to the game. Remember that Barnett has a 2nd degree black belt from Rigan Machado, so he wasn't about to be caught in the same armbar that Royce caught Kimo in. The weight difference between Kimo and Royce was probably greater than the difference between Ryron and Barnett, in fact. AND there were punches in the mix. In any case, it never hurts to be open-minded, imo