Herschel Walker wins first MMA fight
Herschel Walker defeated Greg Nagy in the third round on Saturday night to win his MMA debut. Referee Troy Waugh called the fight after Walker drove Nagy into the fence and then proceeded to pummel him with a flurry of punches.
From TSN.com:
“The experience was exciting,” Walker said. “This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
Still trim and fit at 47, Walker used his strength advantage to wear down the 26-year-old Nagy (1-2). He appeared to be close to the win near the end of the second five-minute round, but Nagy managed to extend the bout.
In his football days, Walker dropped jaws with a workout regimen that included upwards of 3,000 situps and pushups everyday. He also holds a fifth-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do.
Considering that most athletes-turned-MMA-fighters get crushed in their MMA debuts, this is impressive. I have no idea who the hell Greg Nagy is, but well done Herschel, well done.
Photo from fOTOGLIF
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For the record, most “athlete-turned-MMA-fighters” win their first fights because it’s in the promoter’s interest to match them against a can. Which is, not coincidentally, what happened with Walker last night.
What players succeed? I’m not disagreeing with you (I admit I know very little about MMA), but all I can think about is Jose Canseco and Jonnie Morton getting pummeled in their MMA debuts.
Who are the athletes you are referring to? I am not disagreeing either, just want to know who your talking about.
Well Herschel Walker is probably the biggest name guy to have done this, but there are a couple other examples I can think of. Granted two of these are of the “famous for something else” variety rather than “former pro athlete”, but for marketing purposes the distinction doesn’t really matter.
Brock Lesnar won his first fight against a guy named Min-Soo Kim, though he did lose his first fight in the UFC to Frank Mir. Some people, myself included, thought he was jobbed by a bad standup and point deduction in that fight.
Bobby Lashley, who also fought on the Strikeforce card last night, is now 5-0 after fighting against no one that was a real threat.
Ray Mercer knocked out Tim Sylvia last summer. This was the most impressive of the bunch by the way.
Both of the former NFL players on the most recent season of the Ultimate Fighter had won their first fights in smaller organizations that I haven’t heard of.
Beyond that the truth is that a large number of MMA fighters started out in something else, particularly the guys who have been around for a long time. Usually they start out in some other form of combat sport or wrestling. Many started competing in kickboxing, BJJ, or judo events. There are a lot of former NCAA wrestlers, at least one Olympic level greco-Roman wrestler (Couture), and considerably more former pro wrestlers than most promoters would feel comfortable admitting.
Oh, and this seems somewhat relevant and cracked me up.
http://www.cagepotato.com/power-ranger-wins-mma-debut-despite-compl
ete-lack-spandex-unitard