Quote Originally Posted by El Gamo
Well who is the best UFc fighter? Randy Couture. He has been in a ring for something like 6 fights right? In RINGS and IVC? And he's lost 3 of them. I think that tells you about the difference between a cage and ring. The difference in rules. The fact that PRIDE fighters were over confident. If you don't think these are factors then seriously bro,I don't know what else to say. Sure they SHOULd HAVE prepared but whether they did or not,well,let's just say that all these deranged UFC fans are going overboard saying that PRIDE fighters were overrated etc. Lets wait a year,see how they fare,rather than off a fight or two.

And remember,you're judging those 3 fighters losses,Shogun has only had 1 fight! Look at the sustained success achieved by Anderson and Rampage. Like I said,time will tell,I favour Shogun etc to do much much better than their initial showings.
Hey I can't stand "deranged UFC fans" either. I don't think Pride was overrated one bit. I think what we are seeing is that the quality of the two orgs top fighters was a lot closer than many thought. That being said I won't argue that Pride's stable was much deeper top to bottom. I'll change my statement about the cage somewhat. Yes it takes an adjustment, but we are talking about world class fighters and against what was at least perceived as much weaker opponents. The cage shouldn't have played that much of a crucial role. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't remeber any of the Pride fighter losses in the cage or UFC fighters victories in the ring being impacted a lot by the cage or lack of. Maybe elbows played some role in CC's loss to Gonzaga, but not at all to Kongo. As far as Shogun goes my personal opinion (which is completely unfounded) is that not being able to use performance enhancing products caused his stamina issues. I expect him to ultimately succeed, but not at the tremendous level we saw in Japan.