On the latest edition of the Bloody Elbow Mailbag, Managing Editor Anton Tabuena discusses various topics such as mental health awareness in MMA, Tyron Woodley’s BJJ black belt, and a 165 lb division.
The BE Mailbag is back, and based on several of our reader questions, I’m tackling topics such as a 165 lb division, Tyron Woodley’s black belt, and influential martial arts films.
DrBJJ: With the current push towards mental health for athletes, why doesn’t UFC employ sports psychology professionals?
Frankly, they should. Even if just as an addition to their credentialed staff at the two UFC Performance Institute branches. It’s nice when champions like Rose Namajunas and Georges St-Pierre openly talk about it, but sports — especially an uber-machismo one like MMA — still have a long way to go when it comes to mental health awareness. Having more professionals involved would definitely be a step in the right direction.
madmikethb79: How legit is Tyron Woodley’s black belt? I’d be interested to hear if BJJ experts think Tyron Woodley is really practicing jiu jitsu at a black belt level… I guess I’m also asking, does a black belt from Din Thomas mean as much as a black belt from (insert name of BJJ instructor from whom black belts are taken quite seriously)?
Din Thomas, I believe, is a third degree black belt under Ricardo Liborio, who is one of the most highly regarded BJJ and MMA coaches out there. So yes, both Liborio and Thomas are taken quite seriously.
Woodley has a wrestling base, but he has also been training in a gi for years under both Liborio and Thomas, so that wasn’t a random promotion from thin air. While I don’t expect him to purely grip fight and win gold at the Mundials (very few do, and that’s not what he’s training for), I am pretty sure he can, and routinely does, out grapple a lot of BJJ black belts.
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Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports
Foreign Object: What martial arts movies influenced you the most? and what’s the best MMA movie?
I could probably pretend it was any of those Bruce Lee films, but nah, the most influential martial arts film to me is definitely 3 Ninjas. Rocky, Colt and Tum Tum made me and my two brothers want to learn how to murderlize bad guys.
As for MMA movies, I haven’t particularly liked most of them as there’s a looooot of terrible terrible ones, but I guess Warrior isn’t one of them.
deepbeep: If you could go on a weekend bender with any professional fighter, who would it be?
Tank Abbott seems like the kind of guy who can drink all day and tell interesting stories about MMA’s early days, but I don’t think anyone should be inviting him to do that nowadays.
Also, is it still a bender if it’s pretty much normal daily life almost? Because I guess my answer is Nick Diaz. I’m not the type to do anything more than alcohol and weed, but I’d enjoy bumming around, slinging nunchucks and sharing JMMA stories with Diaz.
LankyDave94: Do you wanna be a fuckin fighter?
I train regularly and compete from time to time for fun, but no, I really don’t.
I don’t even like it when people throw that label around, because to me there’s a massive difference between the lifestyles of hobbyists and legitimate fighters. I understand what a lot of these fighters sacrifice and go through, and I (and a lot of other people who front and call themselves that on social media) am definitely not on that level.
Mmaverick: Will there be a 165 lb division or is it just a pipe dream for a certain few fighters?
At this point, there’s less reason to not have a 165 lb division, and to move welterweight to 175 lbs. The deep talent pool at 170 and 155 can handle creating a new division. There would be more uniform, 10 lb separations, from flyweight to middleweight (and possibly less extreme weight cuts?). There would also be one more marketable champion, potentially more super-fights, and hopefully less need for unnecessary interim belts to headline PPVs.
Dana White is being stubborn as always, but let’s hope this is just like the time he was adamant that women would “never” fight in the UFC.
If you have other questions and want them them featured on our next column, you can tweet me @antontabuena using the hashtag #BEmailbag, or simply comment on our fanpost about it.