Why doesn't boxing, wrestling, and most Western fighting sports suffer from the Mcdojo phenomenon?

[Buka]

We had it out here in Arizona in the mid '60s, although it wasn't as big a deal as it later became. We just called it "wrestling" or "collegiate wrestling" ...but it was what they now refer to as "folkstyle". I'd heard about greco-roman and freestyle but never saw it done around here.

BTW this guy was my coach. I'll never forget him.

Antonio

Antonio

www.figsandfamiglia.com

Wait ...isn't that a "wild hare"?

...I mean sure having a wild hair in a sensitive place would be un comfortable too, I guess, but not to the same degree!

Great pics of your coach.

We knew of wrestling at the college level. We, too, knew it as "collegiate wrestling." That's all we ever called it or heard it called.

 

[dvcochran]

Yeah, it's odd. I was heavily into high school sports, never even once thought of wrestling as part of high school. It just wasn't there.

My Sophomore year was the first year our schools had wrestling. We got ragged hard by other sports. It was a faggot sport and a queer sport and such.
The DC coach for the football team was the wrestling coach. He finally convinced a group of starters on the foot ball team to agree to workout with the wrestling team for one week.
After they discovered how much harder wrestling practices were versus football was all the name calling ended. The wrestling soon doubled in size and we were finally able to fill out a full team by weight categories.

 

[isshinryuronin]

After they discovered how much harder wrestling practices were versus football

Around 1971 I took wrestling at the community college. At that time I was working on my 2nd degree in karate, 20 yrs old and was pretty well ripped. Constant karate training and running left me with no fat. - but nothing compared to wrestling workouts! I often got nose bleed from the exertion. The constant muscular resistance stamina demand was a different type of workout than I had experienced. Not fast twitch, not raw strength, More like sanchin kata. It remains the toughest workout I have ever done.

 

[dvcochran]

Around 1971 I took wrestling at the community college. At that time I was working on my 2nd degree in karate, 20 yrs old and was pretty well ripped. Constant karate training and running left me with no fat. - but nothing compared to wrestling workouts! I often got nose bleed from the exertion. The constant muscular resistance stamina demand was a different type of workout than I had experienced. Not fast twitch, not raw strength, More like sanchin kata. It remains the toughest workout I have ever done.

Agree. And that is exactly what the football guys experienced. Being in a constant strain is just a different kind of pressure testing.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

The good news is that even pure sport application is primarily about controlling position and the more dominant your position the bigger advantage you have in applying punching, kneeing, gouging, finger breaking, groin grabbing, etc.

And, generally speaking, the more dominant your position, the closer you are (in terms of chance of success, or steps to get there) to being able to stand up.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

This really took me back to my Roman-Greco wrestling days in High school & college. One round both people up, one round starting on the bottom, one round starting on the top.

This was how we trained in my Judo classes, too.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

No, I don't have it backwards unless you do too, because I am saying something close to what you are.


I wouldn't know. According to my wife I'm never right.



Well, this part of the thread is going on because there seems to be some confusion or lack of consensus between Dropbear and 'Treker about the difference between the <cough> 'words' of "bullshido" and "mcdojo." And it's not like OED is going to say that the one is right and the other wrong. So, yeah, these 'terms" are not exactly set in stone; far less so than even the somewhat flexible and evolving nature of English is.

I therefore content that "bullshido" and "mcdojo" kinda mean whatever the user wants them to mean, within a certain fairly broad context of "bad martial arts." And Dropbear certainly can't say with any particular authority that "technically" one means x and the other means y. At least for now.

Peace favor your sword,
Kirk

That's true of a lot of words that are actually in the dictionary. Context matters a lot, and very few dictionary definitions can really define the bounds of a word's meaning. "Self-defense" is in the dictionary, but we know from discussions here that there are different usages - some of them fairly common.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Crazy. It's in all the schools around here. What I'm really happy to see is a robust judo program in the high schools around here, and has since the 1950s. It's a great compliment to wrestling. Wrestling is a winter sport, and judo is a spring sport, so kids can do both if they're interested. So, we've had Judo for longer than you guys have even had wrestling.

What's really cool is that judo doesn't cut anyone and works on belts, not JV or Varsity, so everyone who wants to join the team can join, and everyone competes.

If Judo had been offered as a sport, I might have been something more than the 4th-string goalie on the soccer team.

 

[Buka]

Around 1971 I took wrestling at the community college. At that time I was working on my 2nd degree in karate, 20 yrs old and was pretty well ripped. Constant karate training and running left me with no fat. - but nothing compared to wrestling workouts! I often got nose bleed from the exertion. The constant muscular resistance stamina demand was a different type of workout than I had experienced. Not fast twitch, not raw strength, More like sanchin kata. It remains the toughest workout I have ever done.

I always hated working out with wrestlers. They never get tired.

 

[punisher73]

I would say that boxing does suffer from the "McDojo" phenomenon if you look at it a certain way. There are "fitness boxing" gyms popping up all over the place and are probably more readily available than an actual boxing gym.

I have heard many people talk about going there and "learning to box". I don't think that most of those gyms are marketing themselves as teaching "boxing skills" that you would be able to use your boxing in the ring, but this is an assumption that people make. The biggest difference is the marketing. There are many "martial arts" schools that are basically a fitness gym using their art and DO market that you are learning to fight.

There are also some BJJ schools that market to "high end" clientele that really reduce the rolling involved that it used to be known for.

At some point any martial art that becomes hugely financially successful will become more McDojo like. Combat sports are hard and don't draw in large numbers of people to make as much money as a more "consumer friendly" place.

 

[Hanzou]

Good point about BJJ. I studied it for a while, but I kept thinking, "I may be losing this roll, but all the stuff the rules don't allow, like punching, kneeing, gouging, finger breaking, groin grabbing, etc. are exactly what I would be doing right now if this were a real fight.

Also, if I am on the ground, my #1 goal is to get off the ground, not stay there and roll. The technical stand up was the most important thing I learned. I actually learned some good ways to get out of a roll in another training. That did involve striking.

I’m sure the fighters who went up against Royce Gracie in the first few UFCs thought the exact same thing…..

 

[jmf552]

I’m sure the fighters who went up against Royce Gracie in the first few UFCs thought the exact same thing…..

Yeah, I hear you, but that is a whole other level. It is not even in the same universe I'm in. And if you add the possibilities in a street fight of someone having a weapon or accomplices, the ground is not where I want to be.

 

[Hanzou]

Yeah, I hear you, but that is a whole other level. It is not even in the same universe I'm in. And if you add the possibilities in a street fight of someone having a weapon or accomplices, the ground is not where I want to be.

It shouldn't be. The same principles that stop guys from punching Royce in the face or grabbing his nuts while he has them in Guard should be being taught to all BJJ students, including you.

Also someone having a weapon and/or accomplices is something that can pop up in any SD situation. It isn't something only BJJ exponents defending themselves need to deal with. I dealt with an overweight sociopath trying to bash my brains in with a hammer, and BJJ saved my ***. The ground wasn't where I wanted to be, but it was where I ended up. Fortunately I knew what I was doing when someone is on top of me.

If all I knew was karate, I'd be dead or a vegetable right now.

 

[jmf552]

It shouldn't be. The same principles that stop guys from punching Royce in the face or grabbing his nuts while he has them in Guard should be being taught to all BJJ students, including you.

Also someone having a weapon and/or accomplices is something that can pop up in any SD situation. It isn't something only BJJ exponents defending themselves need to deal with. I dealt with an overweight sociopath trying to bash my brains in with a hammer, and BJJ saved my ***. The ground wasn't where I wanted to be, but it was where I ended up. Fortunately I knew what I was doing when someone is on top of me.

If all I knew was karate, I'd be dead or a vegetable right now.

I'm glad you had a successful outcome with BJJ when you really needed it. And I respect that you have found a martial art that you seem to click with. Everyone's experience is different. If there were only one best art for everyone, there would only be one art.

 

[drop bear]

Yeah, I hear you, but that is a whole other level. It is not even in the same universe I'm in. And if you add the possibilities in a street fight of someone having a weapon or accomplices, the ground is not where I want to be.

And you prevent that by avoiding the ground in training?

So say I didn't want to get punched in the face in a street fight. I would avoid boxing because that is all they seem do do.

 

[Hanzou]

I'm glad you had a successful outcome with BJJ when you really needed it. And I respect that you have found a martial art that you seem to click with. Everyone's experience is different. If there were only one best art for everyone, there would only be one art.

Well it's not about what is "the best art", it's about this bizarre logical trap that many people use to try to argue themselves out of training certain things. Your argument that you don't want to go to the ground in a multiple attacker scenario is a valid point, however, then saying that that is a weakness of BJJ is a bizarre conclusion. Yes, you don't want to get knocked to the ground when fighting multiple opponents, which is why it's probably a very good idea to learn how to fight off of your back in case you do get knocked to the ground, or learn how to sweep someone on top of you in order to regain a dominant position.

There was a SD case a few years ago where a female Karateka was attacked by an assailant and tackled to the ground. This female was a black belt and had one several championships, so she wasn't untrained. However, she was never able to get the assailant off of her despite her constant kicking and punching. The assailant only fled when another person showed up on the scene. The female had significant injuries to her face and body, and if the attack had continued, she could have very likely been killed.

I'm sure she didn't want to go to the ground either.

 

[Urban Trekker]

I would say that boxing does suffer from the "McDojo" phenomenon if you look at it a certain way. There are "fitness boxing" gyms popping up all over the place and are probably more readily available than an actual boxing gym.

I have heard many people talk about going there and "learning to box". I don't think that most of those gyms are marketing themselves as teaching "boxing skills" that you would be able to use your boxing in the ring, but this is an assumption that people make. The biggest difference is the marketing. There are many "martial arts" schools that are basically a fitness gym using their art and DO market that you are learning to fight.

I've only heard of cardio kickboxing, but not a Western boxing version of this. If people are going to places like this to learn how to fight, when the gym is clearly marketing itself as a fitness/cardio studio, then calling the place a "McDojo" implies that it's the gym's fault that people are signing up for memberships for the wrong reasons.

I don't know whether or not I've stated this before in another thread, but I've never understood why anyone would sign up for "cardio kickboxing" or anything similar. Even if physical fitness is your main goal, the intensity of the training will be the same in an actual martial arts studio. Seems to be a more efficient use of one's time and money to sign up for actual martial arts training, so that at least actually learning how to fight can be a byproduct of the training.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

And you prevent that by avoiding the ground in training?

So say I didn't want to get punched in the face in a street fight. I would avoid boxing because that is all they seem do do.

I like your point. I'd suggest BJJ probably isn't the analog to boxing in this, though, because BJJ competition seems to heavily favor ground play. Something that has a higher penalty on being taken down might be better at developing anti-takedown. Judo seems like maybe more suited, though MMA is definitely offering more incentive to stay the heck off the ground if you're not great there.

So, screw BJJ. Do MMA.

 

[jmf552]

Well it's not about what is "the best art", it's about this bizarre logical trap that many people use to try to argue themselves out of training certain things. Your argument that you don't want to go to the ground in a multiple attacker scenario is a valid point, however, then saying that that is a weakness of BJJ is a bizarre conclusion. Yes, you don't want to get knocked to the ground when fighting multiple opponents, which is why it's probably a very good idea to learn how to fight off of your back in case you do get knocked to the ground, or learn how to sweep someone on top of you in order to regain a dominant position.

There was a SD case a few years ago where a female Karateka was attacked by an assailant and tackled to the ground. This female was a black belt and had one several championships, so she wasn't untrained. However, she was never able to get the assailant off of her despite her constant kicking and punching. The assailant only fled when another person showed up on the scene. The female had significant injuries to her face and body, and if the attack had continued, she could have very likely been killed.

I'm sure she didn't want to go to the ground either.

Let me dumb it down for you: You do you, I'll do me.

 

[jmf552]

And you prevent that by avoiding the ground in training?

So say I didn't want to get punched in the face in a street fight. I would avoid boxing because that is all they seem do do.

I didn't say I avoided ground training. I just said I tried BJJ and didn't care for it, because those guys want to stay on the ground. The ground training I've had is about breaking contact and getting up. If BJJ emphasized that, I'd be all in.

But I am just expressing my opinion that applies to me only. You make your choices, I'll make mine.