ON THE MAT: UFC's effect on prep wrestling

UFC Champ Brock Lesnar                           - AP

The worlds of mixed-martial arts and amateur wrestling share many common bonds, the most of which may be the horizons that the newly-found popularity of UFC has opened up for exceptional wrestling talents.

A decade or two ago, there weren’t many options for high school state champion grapplers or NCAA All-Americans around the country. While young baseball, basketball and football players grow up with stars in their eyes with dreams of a day where they might be competing in the Major Leagues, NBA or NFL, wrestlers mostly use their skills as a catapult to a college scholarship or some notoriety in school.

That doesn’t have to be the case anymore. With the growing exposure that MMA and Ultimate Fighting is receiving in the main stream sports media (ESPN, Sports Illustrated, etc.), kids all around the country are starting to look at athletes like Chuck Liddell or Brock Lesnar the way that guys in previous generations might have looked at Michael Jordan, Ted Williams or Joe Namath.

Amateur wrestlers have wrongly received a lot flack from people not familiar with the sport about the parallels between their pastime and sports entertainment like the WWE. Like Judd Nelson’s character in The Breakfast Club said, “I have such a deep admiration for guys who roll around on the floor with other guys.”

Anyone who has competed or been around the sport knows about the hard work, determination and dedication that need to be devoted to be successful on the mat. It seems like MMA, for the first time in a long time, may remove the stigma that had been previously been attached to wrestling by some people.

Florida is one of the states in the country where wrestling is taken very seriously at the high school level. In fact, Brandon High School’s program was highlighted by ESPN in a television special called The Streak last year. The Eagles are one of the foremost examples of what kind of doors wrestling can open to a community of young athletes who grow up with it.

Now here is a closer look at how amateur wrestling personalities in the Tampa Bay area feel about the MMA-wrestling connection.

Eric Swensen
Springstead Coach, former Scholar All-American for Springfield (MA) College

“UFC (MMA) has been huge for (amateur) wrestling. Wrestling is one of the core ingredients for MMA.  Wrestlers learn to take people down, throw, grapple and defend. Besides, for the Gracie Family, wrestlers made the UFC what it is. If you look at the current (fighters), most have high school wrestling backgrounds, and many have college backgrounds. UFC has been great for our guys. We have seen Corey Hill, Gilbert Burgos and Reggie Pena (all Springstead alumni) all get professional contracts.”

Threatening Three: Swensen’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Brock Lesnar – “The Champ wrestled in high school in Webster, S.D. and placed fourth in the state. Then he went on to become an (NCAA) national champion at (the University of) Minnesota.” Lesnar is the current UFC Heavyweight Champion thanks to beating Frank Mir at UFC 100. After college, he also tried his hand at the WWE (former WWE Champion) and the NFL (DE for the Minnesota Vikings).
2. Dan Henderson – “He (qualified for the 1993 NCAA National Championships.) I think he was with (Arizona) St. He was also a (two-time) Olympic wrestler.” Henderson was a member of the 1992 and 1996 U.S. Olympic Greco-Roman wrestling team.
3. Matt Hammill – “He is a deaf wrestler who most people (first) saw on The Ultimate Fighter. We wrestled against him in college when he went to Rochester (Institute of Technology). He gave one of my teammates one of the worst beatings a college guy can get.” Nicknamed “The Hammer,” Hammill was a three-time NCAA Division III Champion.

Mike Porcelli
Citrus Coach, former NCAA qualifier with Iowa State, alternate for 1988 U.S. Olympic team

“My family is deeply entrenched in MMA and wrestling. My brother Anthony has a wrestling/MMA business in Des Moines, Iowa. My youngest brother Alex has competed in NCAA wrestling, grappling and cage fighting. My experience has been solely with wrestling (folk, freestyle and Greco-roman). That will probably change since USA wrestling has added grappling as a sanctioned sport. The Citrus 3-Style Club (Porcelli’s club) name will be a misnomer and we'll have to change the name. Now, our best wrestlers have a choice when they graduate from college whether to follow the MMA path or stay on an Olympic track and train for wrestling throughout an Olympic cycle. I think you'll see more wrestlers going the MMA way to start making money and help support their families. At Citrus, we have a couple of kids who do grappling/Jiu-jitsu/wrestling. The grappling style is a sport that resembles wrestling. The submission holds and training in the guard position will be helpful techniques when competing in cage fighting.”

Threatening Three: Porcelli’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Dan Severn – “When UFC first started, years ago, Severn dominated the UFC championship fights.” Nicknamed “The Beast,” Severn was a four-time All-American at Arizona State. He first fought in the UFC in UFC 4 where he was defeated in the finals by one of the fathers of the sport, Royce Gracie. He is a member of the UFC Hall of Fame. He also took part in sports entertainment with the WWE and NWA. He actually once held the NWA Heavyweight Championship.
2. Joe Warren – “Warren, a former Greco-roman world champion (2006) who fights in the lightweight division and has won championships over in Japan. He has a huge win over ‘Kid’ Yamamoto and is extremely tough.” Warren was a wrestler at Michigan and won the 2006 Pan-Am Games title.
3. Dan Henderson – “You have to give props to Henderson because he was one of the pioneering wrestlers who went on to fighting and winning world championships.”

Russ Schenk
Anclote Coach, former River Ridge Coach, former state champion for Tarpon Springs

“I know the MMA/UFC has brought more kids into the wrestling rooms around the country, and that alone is a positive. When wrestling coaches get more student athletes in their room, the opportunity to teach life lessons increase and more young athletes are given a chance to grow and mature into disciplined athletes. Wrestling and MMA/UFC are two, if not the only two sports, where there is no required body type to be successful. What matters are the work ethic, heart and internal drive required to become a champion. Everyone who wrestles gets the opportunity to achieve these skills that last a lifetime. MMA/UFC and wrestling have one major thing in common. To be successful you must train, train and train. Wrestlers have done it for decades, and MMA/UFC is another avenue where student athletes can develop (the same) life skills.”

Threatening Three: Schenk’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Corey Hill - “He has been a favorite of mine since he was at Springstead winning two state titles and wrestling for (Coach) Bob Levija.” Hill was on The Ultimate Fighter a couple years ago, but then he suffered an awful right shin fracture in a match with Dale Hartt at UCF: Fight for the Troops last year.
2. Kevin Jackson – “I really enjoyed watching when (Jackson) beat a guy with a headlock a number of years ago (1997).” Jackson, a wrestler for both LSU and Iowa State while in college, was a four-time NCAA All-American. He lost a UFC Middleweight Title bout to the legendary Frank Shamrock in 1997.
3. Rulon Gardner – “Of course, Gardner is a great guy and very tough. I had the opportunity to wrestle with him when I was at Culver Academy. He is an awesome athlete, so quick and smooth.” Gardner wrestled one match in MMA on December 31, 2004. He is 1-0 with a unanimous decision over Hidehiko Yoshida in a Pride event.

Michael Cardwell
Dunedin Coach

“I competed in several submission grappling tournaments about four years ago. I had a lot of success, and I owe it all to my wrestling background. I learned submission defense and used wrestling for takedowns and position control. MMA offers wrestlers a professional outlet above and beyond their amateur careers. Besides being a collegiate or Olympic coach, there isn’t a lot of opportunity to make a living with a wrestling background. Not a lot of students talk about MMA careers yet. Most MMA athletes start off in one discipline and try to compete at a national level first and foremost. Whether it is kickboxing, Jiu jitsu or wrestling, MMA is usually an afterthought or something that is stumbled into.”

Threatening Three: Schenk’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Matt Hughes – Hughes was a two-time high school state champion in Illinois in 1991 and 1992. In college, he was earned All-American honors twice while competing at Eastern Illinois University. He is a former UFC Welterweight Champion, and in his last fight, he won Fight of the Night with a win over Matt Serra at UFC 98 in May.
2. Brock Lesnar 
3. Randy Couture – Couture was a high school state champion in Washington in 1982. After serving in the U.S. Army, he was a three-time Olympic alternate (1988, 1992 and 1996). He was also a three-time NCAA All-American at Oklahoma State. Couture is a former UFC Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight Champion.

Roy Reyes
Central (Brooksville) Coach, former state runner-up for Central, former national runner-up for Pensacola Christian

“The UFC provides an option to post-college wrestlers that was not available before. (However,) wrestling is only one component of MMA. It takes toughness to a whole new level with knockouts, submissions and chokes as fair play. The mental discipline of a college wrestler is enough to translate into a good crossover of success in many fields of work. (Unlike other things though,) it is directly applicable to the demands of cage fighting. I think the MMA has proven what many in my sport have known all along. (It has proven) that, standing alone, wrestling is superior to all other forms of unarmed combat save perhaps Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. The UFC and MMA have been very good for wrestlers who have pursued fighting as an extension of their competitive careers. It has been nothing but positive about highlighting the skills of my sport. I have heard more kids in high school wrestling mention it as a possible goal after high school. It is definitely gaining some steam from a few years back, but I would still say that it is the minority of high school wrestlers are eyeing the MMA for their futures.”

Threatening Three: Reyes’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Brock Lesnar – “He is a total freak of nature, but he is not the best role model as far as sportsmanship. His meteoric rise to the top speaks volumes as far as his abilities. UFC champ in only five fights? Case closed.”
2. Matt Hughes – “This high school and NCAA stud was actually coaching at the college level when he turned into an MMA fighter, and then he produced a Hall of Fame career. He really helped showcase the skills of wrestling through his impressive championship run. (He’s just) a mid-west workhorse with nothing but basic wrestling.”
3. Josh Koscheck – “An NCAA Champion for Edinboro (PA), Koscheck was one of the original fighters on The Ultimate Fighter. He showed the nation about five or six years ago that with a limited fighting background, a successful wrestler could hang with UFC middleweights.” In 2001, Koscheck went undefeated on his way to being a NCAA Champion. He earned the Knockout of the Night at UFC: Fight for the Troops while defeating Yoshiyuki Yoshida in December 2008.

John Lawton
Webmaster for Scout.com Florida Wrestling Forum

“The challenge in amateur wrestling has always been, ‘What can a wrestler do after he/she uses up all of their scholastic and collegiate eligibility to continue in the sport and also to pay the bills and support a family and the costs of everyday living?’ MMA offers the opportunity to earn monetary rewards for wrestlers to use the skills they developed in amateur wrestling in competitions that will enable them to fund their athletic training. At this time, very few have considered that option but with the completion of UFC 100 where a Florida wrestling alumnus, Tom Lawlor, was on the bill, they now have their eyes open to the possibilities of earning some much-needed cash.”

Threatening Three: Lawton’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Dan Severn
2. Kurt Angle – The 1996 Olympic gold medalist has never fought in an MMA bout. However, he has shown more than casual interest. He has said in many interviews that he wants to compete in the UFC before his career is over.
3. Tom Lawlor – A three-time NCWA (National Collegiate Wrestling Association) Champion at UCF, Lawlor was featured on The Ultimate Fighter. He won Submission of the Night at UFC 100 by defeating C.B. Dollaway in his pay-per-view debut.

Mike Lastra
Nature Coast Coach, former state qualifier for Central

“Whenever I try and talk new wrestlers into wrestling, the first thing I ask is if they watch UFC. Then I tell them that most of the stars have some sort of wrestling background. In the past there weren’t many opportunities for college wrestlers who wanted to continue wrestling after college. You had the Olympics and other world class tournaments, but you had to be one of the top wrestlers in not only the U.S. but the world. MMA gives wrestlers many different platforms to continue with the sport. Just about every high school wrestler is an MMA fan, so it’s only natural that they all look up to these fighters and want to end up in the UFC.”

Threatening Three: Lastra’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Brock Lesnar – “He is the first one that comes to mind. He is probably one of the most popular fighters with the kids these days. Everyone knows his story – a college national champion, a WWE star, and now a UFC fighter who, in my opinion, won’t lose for a while.”
2. Matt Hughes – “Hughes is another fighter with wrestling background.  He was a two-time high school state champion and a NCAA All-American. Watching him fight, you can tell he was a former wrestler.”
3. Georges St. Pierre – “Although St. Pierre did not wrestle in high school or college, he is a phenomenal wrestler. He has one of the best shots in the UFC, and his takedown percentage is the highest.”

Michael Heagney
Gainesville Assistant, former two-time state placer for Springstead

“MMA has offered a lot to post-college wrestling. Ex-wrestlers have often been extremely successful, and the transition time from wrestling to MMA is very quick. I think its a great option for someone who is not ready to give up competing, which in the past before MMA would seem like the only option. Now you can make a living in this sport, which would be (almost) impossible in post-college wrestling. I have heard a lot of people I know wanting to do MMA. I believe it takes a certain kind of person to want to make a legit transition to that sport. I have heard more talk than action though. When I wrestled in college, one of the guys on the team competed in MMA during the offseason. That is about it for people I know actually competing other than (former Springstead wrestler) Corey Hill. MMA still seems out of reach to so many. Many guys like to talk about doing it but don't know really how to get involved and fight. This problem seems more prevalent in small towns like Spring Hill or up here in Gainesville."

Threatening Three: Heagney’s Top Three Fighters with Wrestling Ties
1. Urijah Faber – Faber was a walk-on at University of California at Davis and earned a scholarship after his freshman year. He was a two-time NCAA qualifier there. He was the World Extreme Cagefighting (WEC) Featherweight Champion from 2006-08.
2. Brock Lesnar
3. Georges St. Pierre

As you can see, the MMA craze is not only hitting mainstream sports, but it also seems to be opening doors for a new generation of athlete. For more information and news on UFC and mixed martial arts, check out Doug Drexler, the Tampa MMA Examiner on http://www.examiner.com/x-7825-Tampa-MMA-Examiner.