There have been countless articles and rankings on the history of the sport, you know, since no one had even heard of MMA before the UFC.

Let’s forget that Pancrase did his show before the Gracie did.

Before the UFC, the Gracie had a combined record of 7,819,952-0 in no-holds-barred bouts, in the years before the UFC was created.

Let’s also not forget that while the UFC is the big dog sitting on the porch, there were times when various promotions were beating them, the only reason they became the big dog is that the Fertitta brothers had several million to burn before to have to worry. about profit I wonder if Pride hadn’t run like the California state government if the UFC would be as big as it was. God knows MMA has always been able to make money off the woodwork.

With that said, I think we can look back and analyze how MMA has evolved.

So let’s take a look at what I’m going to call generational MMA. As the sport has evolved, you can classify most fighters into 4 eras. I also have an A side, which would be the first of the generation to move forward, and a B side, which would be considered the last of that generation.

First generation:

Alexander the Great to Royce Gracie.

A first-gen fighter is one who comes into the fight with one of two backgrounds: either he’s a backyard brawler with an iron chin who’s just going to push himself and it’s going to hurt you, or he’s super skilled in one aspect of MMA, and his skill is better than your skill.

The A-side would be the likes of Tank Abbott and the hundreds of guys of his ilk.

Side B would be the Gracie family,

Gracie is just a master at Ju-Ju, and could beat just about anyone with it.

Dan Severn was a wrestling master, and look at that amazing prowess.

Look at the attack of those two men in the early days, that is the definition of a G1 fighter. My Karate will knock you out, unless you take me down and then I’m done. But if I catch you…

Dinosaur G1.

Matt Hughes.

Hughes might be the greatest of the G1 fighters. Why do I consider it a G1? Explain to me where his hands worked. If he went out and fought today, he’s looking for a takedown or spread. He is a submission fighter who just outclassed everyone. Would he work today he? Not really. He spent most of his post-GSP career trying to get a knockout and got crushed. I say this as a fan of Matt Hughes.

Generation 2

Frank Shamrock at TUF 1

Generation 2 is the fighter who started out in one discipline and became an expert in another, or simply blended the two styles.

You see Belfort, he is not just a striker, he is almost complete. You look at Randy and he becomes more than just a fighter. I think you can even put Tito in this category. He is a fighter, who works in good hands. This generation is more training. In G1, you mainly train on one thing and then see if your ability can beat their ability. G2, we’ve gotten a little better, you spend MWF in the wrestling gym, then Tuesday and Saturday you went across town and boxed. You have guys who went from Skill to SkillSet.

Dinosaur G2: Tito Ortiz, Chuck Liddell, Fedor

Generation 3

2006 to 2012

This is where the line gets a little harder to draw, these are the fighters they always fought under the unified rules, almost all of their fights will be on Sherdog’s fight finder, the main difference is that the fighters are trained in MMA, not just wrestling, Karate, or Ju-Ju. When you walk past the school, it’s not Joe’s Wag-Fu school with a banner out front that says we teach UFC.

It’s Jackson’s MMA or Xtreme Couture or something like that, you don’t do a single discipline, or worry about Gi Training, it’s fighting, all day every day. You have an explosion of money, promotions or quality of fighters, you have guys who could be in the NFL or NBA trying out MMA, and some even fighting. You leave wrestling as a draw and the wrestler is a draw. The gimmicks largely disappeared and things became standardized. Mainly. We also have women’s MMA, and people who get title fights and headline fights because of the drawing power.

Generation 3 fighters are like Jon Jones or Rory McDonald.

Dinosaur G3: Like birds, they walk among us.

Generation 4

2013 -?

This is the current day, we have a top dog, so we have the NBA of MMA, the UFC, and we have the top EuroLeagues where their top guys could compete in Bellator and WSOF. There may be some guys who can beat the UFC title holder, but there is no promotion where their top 5 can win a series against the UFC’s top 5.

We also have a time when there is money in the business. Not just for the UFC but you can never fight in the UFC and make a living in Bellator or even some smaller promotions maybe not a good way to live but you have trainers who don’t have to deliver pizza to get to End of the month. .

The sport is also in the newspapers, on all the sports channels, in all the states, and almost everyone agrees with the rules. You don’t have to learn one set of rules in Vegas and another in Sweden.

Where do we go from here?

Well, I can’t see the formation of a Union, it’s just not going to happen. I can see a real challenger to the UFC lineup, maybe after Dana retires and WME-IMG puts a suit in the office. Will that put it to a G5? I do not think. I’m not sure what gravitational shift will occur that could form a G5. Maybe if someone dies and they move the security line the other way. Maybe if the UFC has to mandate Head Gear and ban low licks, that will make a G5 happen.