Mellor wrote: » Well yeah. Is that not really obvious? Most coaches have a background in one aspect of fighting or another. It makes sense to pick a coach that's best suited to a particular fight, rather than the gym hierarchy (which is often just business). For example, John was slated for being in the Floyd corner, yet if he missed a striker v striker match in the octagon, it looks like he's be slated. Seems a bit inconsistent to me. You said it was arrogant to miss it. I'm of the opinion that arrogance is thinking your the best coach for every situation.
pastorbarrett wrote: » Arbitrary yes, but based on the croke park snaps on Instagram I'd say Conor is still out of camp and letting loose a little...
Deleted User wrote: » In my opinion a top gym is one that consistently produces high quality and high-ranked pro fighters. The gym overall has a good W:L record. Fighters who join show a marked improvement in some areas of their fighting (implying top coaching). Top pros seek out the gym because they believe they can improve there.
qwabercd wrote: Ireland is a tiny country with a very small pool of fighters. Much harder for sbg to attract fighters than the big gyms in the US. Favours to Conor or not, we have definitely overachieved in MMA.
[Deleted User] wrote: » 'Thats debatable' means that I disagree (that they are in the top 1%) but am willing to listen to your argument. There are 565 fighters in the UFC currently and the number of fighters who can claim to have 'been in the UFC' since it's inception (ie one fight or more) is in the thousands. I also believe it's fair to say that several of the SBG fighters were signed as a favor to Conor, or in order to bundle some token Irish onto Conor's cards. Rather than based on merit. In a world without Conor, most of those guys never see the inside of an octagon. Harsh but true. Therefore merely having 6 guys who were at one time or another signed to the UFC is nothing to shout home about. In any case I don't agree with your criteria for top gym. In my opinion a top gym is one that consistently produces high quality and high-ranked pro fighters. The gym overall has a good W:L record. Fighters who join show a marked improvement in some areas of their fighting (implying top coaching). Top pros seek out the gym because they believe they can improve there. SBG doesn't tick those boxes imo. We might as well be saying Glendale is one of the best gyms because of how dominant Rousey was.
Lukker- wrote: » The whole post just comes off as pseudo outrage tbh, sounds like it belongs on Joe Duffy.
dulux99 wrote: » Greg Jackson and Winklejohn have dozens of guys in the UFC, and Cowboy fights 4 or 5 times a year. This was Artem's first and probably only UFC main event. I don't know Artem personally but I imagine he was disappointed that JK wasn't in his corner.
John_D80 wrote: » Wait, so you at least concede that it is debatable that they are top 1% but you still think they are mediocre? Flip flop much?? Or do you just have crazy high standards??
Even from a totally objective point of view their achievements dwarf those of 99.9% of MMA gyms. There are probably thousands of MMA teams across the globe. A few dozen at most would have experienced success on the scale SBG have in the last 5 years. Even excluding Lobov and Ward they have 4 entirely homegrown fighters that have gotten to the UFC. Then you have the likes of Amirkhani and Nelson as well. This is from one team that’s based in a relatively small city compared to most European cities. That’s far from mediocre. That is a very successful team.
dulux99 wrote: » Really?
Deleted User wrote: » That's debatable. Top 1% measured how?
Lukker- wrote: » Ultimate Seduction wrote: » Show us evidence of a head coach missing one of his fighters fights headlining a ufc event to attend a book signing holiday.. Where did I say book signing holiday? Lets see if Greg Jackson or Mike Winkeljohn make the trip for Cowboy at Gdansk at the weekend. So melodramatic in here
Ultimate Seduction wrote: » Show us evidence of a head coach missing one of his fighters fights headlining a ufc event to attend a book signing holiday..
Lukker- wrote: » Plenty of fighters don’t have their head coaches in their corner for every fight. The whole post just comes off as pseudo outrage tbh, sounds like it belongs on Joe Duffy. JK can be grating at times, but I just find this criticism ridiculous. The fact that he wouldn’t miss Conor’s fight is a moot point. He wouldn’t have a book deal and Artem wouldn’t be in the UFC if it wasn’t for Conor. That’s just business
dulux99 wrote: » Maybe this has been done to death but I have to comment on this. John only has 3 UFC fighters in his stable. One of those fighters was having the biggest fight of his career against a top ranked opponent in his first UFC main event, in a potentially life changing fight, had he won. The head coach was in Australia promoting his book, which had already been on shelves a good year at that point. That’s inexcusable in my opinion. The fact that the tour was already booked is a moot point, would he have missed one of Conor’s fights to promote the book? Would he f*ck. The fact that he missed his own fighters main event to promote his already decent-selling book speaks to the arrogance of the man, really. I can’t recall any other head coach in any other sport missing something like that, much less any of the top MMA coaches.
Mellor wrote: » dulux99 wrote: » Maybe this has been done to death but I have to comment on this. John only has 3 UFC fighters in his stable. One of those fighters was having the biggest fight of his career against a top ranked opponent in his first UFC main event, in a potentially life changing fight, had he won. The head coach was in Australia promoting his book, which had already been on shelves a good year at that point. That’s inexcusable in my opinion. The fact that the tour was already booked is a moot point, would he have missed one of Conor’s fights to promote the book? Would he f*ck. The fact that he missed his own fighters main event to promote his already decent-selling book speaks to the arrogance of the man, really. I can’t recall any other head coach in any other sport missing something like that, much less any of the top MMA coaches. Slightly playing devils advocate here, but none the less.Why should John have been there, the actual reason. Simply because he's the head coach is hardly a logical reason imo. He's prob not the best coach for that fight either. A striker, facing a striker, jiu jitsu coach isnt exactly gonna be first choice. I don't think it fair to assume Artem wanted John there ahead of Roddy. Maybe he did, who knows. Maybe Artem knew John had a holiday booked when the offer came in and decided to take it anyway. Again, who knows. I'd say coaches are forced to miss fights all the time. But it simply isn't on our radar here. I can't recall one either, but take Till in the main event this weekend. I have no idea who his coach is. I'd guess he's in Poland right now, but if he's not I'd never hear about it.
John_D80 wrote: » SBGi are easily within the top 1% of MMA teams/gym all over the world. The vast majority of MMA gyms will never enjoy even a tiny fraction of the level of success achieved by them.
Mellor wrote: » Pretty there's an SBG in California.
yourdeadwright wrote: » Put it this way is SBG and all its trainers up sticks and moved to California and opened the gym from there you'd have a whole host of top fighters looking to train there,
John_D80 wrote: » Deleted User wrote: » If they're okay with it I guess it's none of my business but I think Conor's success and the disruption he causes is partly the reason why SBG in general haven't really lived up to their promise and are still at the level of a mediocre small-country gym. Ah here, mediocre small-country gym?? Have a think about what you’re saying there. This gets trotted out from time to time here and it always mystifies me how people can really think this. SBGi are easily within the top 1% of MMA teams/gym all over the world. The vast majority of MMA gyms will never enjoy even a tiny fraction of the level of success achieved by them. Besides having an actual UFC champion, they also have had other legit fighters in the UFC. MOST (but admittedly not all) of whom got there entirely on their own merit. Many very reputable and successful gyms with very good names will never achieve anything like that or even get a single fighter to the likes of the UFC/Bellator/ONE etc.
Deleted User wrote: » If they're okay with it I guess it's none of my business but I think Conor's success and the disruption he causes is partly the reason why SBG in general haven't really lived up to their promise and are still at the level of a mediocre small-country gym.
Deleted User wrote: » Artem's fighting at the weekend and once again it seems Conor played no role in his camp. I know he helps Artem and co in other ways but in terms of training it seems everybody in SBG drops everything to help Conor with his camps, and then when they have their own fights he's in a boat somewhere. If they're okay with it I guess it's none of my business but I think Conor's success and the disruption he causes is partly the reason why SBG in general haven't really lived up to their promise and are still at the level of a mediocre small-country gym. If we think back to the Swanson fight, Kavanagh wasn't even in Lobov's corner because he was busy doing a book tour in Australia.
Lukker- wrote: » Deleted User wrote: » Artem's fighting at the weekend and once again it seems Conor played no role in his camp. I know he helps Artem and co in other ways but in terms of training it seems everybody in SBG drops everything to help Conor with his camps, and then when they have their own fights he's in a boat somewhere. If they're okay with it I guess it's none of my business but I think Conor's success and the disruption he causes is partly the reason why SBG in general haven't really lived up to their promise and are still at the level of a mediocre small-country gym. If we think back to the Swanson fight, Kavanagh wasn't even in Lobov's corner because he was busy doing a book tour in Australia. Maybe he's just not a good training partner? Many top fighters aren't, you have to be selfish at the top, how many top fighters are? Most of the top guys build their camp around them and that's it. I don't even think Conor trains that much between camps, so he's hardly going to be a sparring partner. Wasn't the Kavangh/Australia thing done to death?? Look he's head coach, he's not going to be there every time. The book tour was booked well in advance of Artem getting the Cub fight, he can't cancel a 3 week book tour/multiple seminars because a fighter get's a fight and it doesn't suit. The bulk of his work would have been done in camp, including the gameplan. The lads who cornered him have plenty of experience, having John in his corner wouldn't have made a difference to the outcome of the fight at that stage.
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://wd.vanillicon.com/v2/dcbc16ebc222633fce50824c4b8e3c07.svg)
