Issue 153

April 2017

Ben Saunders, veteran of the UFC, TUF and Bellator, reminds why we owe so much to the original UFC athletes.

I believe I am the last active fighter to have watched UFC 1 on pay-per-view.

After me, that lineage is gone. Everyone will be talking about how the first fight they saw was Tito (Ortiz) vs. Chuck (Liddell) or Ken Shamrock vs. Tito. I am trying to live my dream but also keep that lineage of where I come from alive.

Most guys now wouldn’t recognize the pioneers. Freaking Harold Howard, that guy was hilarious. Most people don’t even know him. Guys like Mark Coleman, Kevin Randleman. It’s been a crazy ride. We’ve seen all these guys retire or, even worse, some of them fall off or pass away.

The pioneers had no blueprint. For me, there was a small one. Now there is a huge blueprint. If you’re smart, you’re at a gym that has at least some basic fundamentals that will get you to where you need to be.

Like everybody else who was watching live at the time, my first look at MMA was Gerard Gordeau kicking Teila Tuli’s face and punching him in the eye. His tooth flies out and he’s gushing blood from his eyes and mouth.

The ref didn’t know what was going on. The ref was told not to stop the fight but everybody was confused and he ended up calling the fight.

Obviously, seeing Royce Gracie at that event was huge. I came from a striking background and he just blew my mind. Watching Bruce Lee movies, you don’t see anything like that. There was no jiu-jitsu or ground fighting showcased at all.

The first fight was Royce vs. the boxer with one glove (Art Jimmerson) who tapped out of fear. I remember wondering if it was fake.

“What is this s**t?” As a kid and as a fan I’m sure many people were super confused and almost thought it might have been a work or something or at least wondering what his mysticism was.

One thing the UFC and MMA brought to the world was taking away the mysticism and the magic of martial arts.

We thought that the dim mak, death touch and Dragon Ball Z was real. None of that really exists, but it might have taken a few UFC events to come to terms with it.

But there are no imaginary guys or Chinese monks in the temples ending lives with a single finger. Granted they do some sick, crazy stuff using some form of chi and internal energy, but to see that practically showcased and transferred into a live fight situation has been shown to be unrealistic. That’s what I took away from the early days of the UFC.

After watching UFC 1, I immediately knew I needed to learn whatever it is that this Brazilian guy was doing. I needed to learn jiu-jitsu.

I knew people were going to try to take me down and I needed to become a ninja off my back. I immediately became obsessed with it.

I was primarily a striker.

You fall in love with the martial art. You learn the top game and the bottom game. You learn wrestling and takedown defense. It just all came together from there. It brought me to where I am today.

There are five or 10 legit camps around the world that you can go to that will actually have it all planned out for you. Great coaches under one roof, already set up for you to create champions. Back in the day, Tank Abbott came off the barstool.

That’s one of the greatest things for me about this sport – being a part of it from the get-go. Watching the evolution, seeing the pioneers and now being a part of history. I’m trying to not just evolve with the sport but to also contribute to that evolution.