The former Heavyweight Champion Josh Barnett expresses his thoughts regarding the Pride fighters in the UFC. There is a lot of talk of former PrideFC athletes performing poorly in the octagon. Fighters such as Mirko Cro Cop, Fabricio Werdum, Mauricio Shogun and Kazuhiro Nakamura have not fought at the level that many have thought they would.
Although there have been several upsets this year alone for X-Pride fighters, there have also been several positive outcomes such as Anderson Silva and Quinton Jackson who have become champions in their division. Amongst the upsets, there are a few who have only fought once and have plenty of time to get accustomed to the American atmosphere and lifestyle.
All we know is that it is definitely too close to judge who are the top MMA fighters in the UFC even with others still coming in to fight like Wanderlei Silva, but here is a snip of what Josh Barnett had to say about all of this:
“I have no idea why some are struggling to adjust. With
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, he just made one mistake and ran into Heath Herring’s
leg. That is a big leg so it is going to take some steam out of you. Nog
recovered well and I think that other than that kick he dominated the rest of
the fight. At the same time Quinton Jackson and Anderson Silva in my eyes are PRIDE fighters.
So you could say that PRIDE owns two belts in the UFC right now. Both of those
guys fought almost all their fights and made their name in PRIDE. They are
PRIDE fighters. It is easy to throw a UFC label on Jackson because he is American. He only
fought one fight in the cage with WFA before he went to the UFC.”
