despite thinking that i may just be insulted for joining this forum, i would like to hear a rational argument from people like tysonjones who appear to believe that mma requires no skill. i'm reading things like 'anyone can get into a cage and choock [sic] someone out' and i don't know whether to laugh or cry. how many people honestly believe this?
anyone who does believe that high level mma like in the ufc or pride is just street fighting, please, try it out once. go into a jiu jitsu gym and see how 'easy' it is to just choke someone out when you've never trained before. see how 'easy' it is to punch a wrestler when he wants to take you down and you've no training to prevent him. i've never understood this narrow mindset that some boxing fans (and journalists, unfortunately) have about mma, and about how those who participate in it are not real athletes.
as has been pointed out, in a boxing match of course mayweather wins, 999 times out of 1000, easy. but in a real fight, where anything goes - which mma is much closer to (but there are rules guys, for those who think it is just a bar room brawl in there) - then mayweather would be submitting before you could blink. boxing is a great sport, and the top boxers are incredible athletes, but it is nothing like a real fight. in mma, you have to be good at everything - submissions, wrestling, punches, kicks, knees, and on and on. you have much, much more to worry about than just punches. so why is it that some people seem to think that mastering such a diverse background does not involve anywhere near the skill level that boxing does? or, even more extreme, that someone like mayweather would beat a top mma fighter in a 'real' fight and not just a boxing match?
i've read the following analogy elsewhere, but i think it's apt enough to repeat: comparing boxing to mma is like comparing throwing a football to playing quarterback. you could have someone who just trains at throwing a ball very, very far. that person could become the best thrower in the world. but try to put him in there in a football game, when he has to worry about pinpoint accuracy while other guys are trying to tackle him, and he's going to fail miserably. same goes with boxing and real fighting. boxing is just one aspect of it. it may be a fun, interesting aspect, but it is not the only thing, nor is it necessarily any harder or more skillful than any other aspect.