This is a clip of Chael Sonnen sparring. It's one of my favorite clips of resistance training.

http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=wIOBYom4WeQ

Chael Sonnen is a complete douchebag! He needs to work on some fundamental BJJ first and foremost.

He is actually quite entertaining. He is a millionaire and has coaches training him so I'm sure he works on jui jitsu more often then us laymen. In short, he gets paid to train.

I wish he'd box more in his fights but other than that he combines stuff pretty well.

Forrest Griffin is a blackbelt in bjj and though it got him the belt his reign didnt last long. He was on the decline for years. Shogun has a blackbelt in bjj and he can't win more than one fight in a row. Sonnen will probably beat Shogun.

Sonnen will not beat Shogun.
Sonnen does not train, nor respect BJJ (his own words) hence his apparent inability to stay out of the basic triangle set up.
He is only entertaining for uneducated hicks. Millionaire does not mean •••• in my book.

Matt Hughes wasn't a big bjj guy and he is regarded as the best welterweight ever.

GSP wrestles and ground and pounds. Like Anderson Silva his bjj is there if needed but not utilized often. Frankie Edgar doesn't use any bjj even though he is a brown belt. Carlos Condit wasn't able to utilize his brown belt in bjj to submit GSP. And on and on and on.

I agree with you that Sonnen can come off sounding like an ahole but I disagree with you the importance of bjj in today's mma. When Royce Gracie hit the scene it dominated but today it is only one price of the puzzle.

I believe the main reason it became so popular was because it is so low impact. I doubt that most people can take the amount of falls that Shuai jiao people and judo people take but they can surely handle low impact rolling that begins on the knees and then goes down. Not only is it low impact but it is competitive and gets in a great workout...but still low impact.

I have to disagree, Jake. Sonnon does train and respect BJJ. His biggest fan and personal BJJ instructor is BJJ blackbelt Vinny Magalhaes.
http://www.mmamania.com/2012/4/4/2925262/ufc-147-chael-sonnen-vinny-magalhaes-an derson-silva

Chael also has also trained with Ceasar Gracie for some time now.

Chael fools a lot of people. I've followed Chael for a long time. Only the hardcore MMA people even knew his name before he started his gimmick. Gimmick or not, he's one of the best MMA fighters at his weight. Don't ask the casual MMA fans or someone who just trains BJJ, but ask the real fighters and they will tell you how good he is.

This is a guy that who stated fighting MMA in the mid-late 90s (when I started)and has fought some legends(even though most new MMA fans don't even know who they are), won 90% of the rounds he's ever fought in over 40 fights.

Talk too much, yes? over does it sometimes, yes?
But not a good fighter? That's crazy!

I'm not uneducated and I don't watch MMA for entertainment purposes.

Chael suffered from the same ailment that many people suffered from who came up in the 90s. As Buddha would say, "all attach leads to further suffering". For the first half of his career he didn't take BJJ serious. He took boxing seriously and wrestling.And He won most of his fights. He was attached wrestling/boxing (BTW)is the most dangerous and efficient style in modern MMA.

He was making that mistake while the BJJ guys were resisting to incorporate more wrestling and striking in their games. Most of them are gone now, unable to keep up with the evolution of fighting.

When Team Quest got (world champ and former UFC fighter)Fabiano Scherner as their BJJ coach, Chael did better, moreover, his friend, team captain and grappling coach was still training him, as he worked with BJ Penn and Caesar Gracie also.

Not many from that era is still around. Chael is and he's competing with the best, with his last two losses coming two of the greatest well round fighters in the history of Martial Arts and Sport.
And a loss my a former Strikeforce champ and to some with as much experience and wrestling as him and BJJ blackbelt, Babalu. The othe loss in the UFC was to maybe the best BJJ fighter in MMA, Damien Maia. There is no shame in those loses.

People have a short memory or just a lack of knowledge, for they fail to remember the "monster"
BJJ black belt/ Judo black belt, BTT's Paulo Filho was. Before he faced Chael, he dominated in japan and won the WEC championship. Did I say dominate?
Well, Chael beat him to a pulp for 4 1/2 rounds(sounds familiar) before in got subbed in the last round. In the rematch, it was the same, he dominate this BJJ blackbelt that had not even had a close match before Chael. He won the fight but didn't get the title, for Paulo missed weight.

Chael peaked my attention back in the BoDog fight league, one where he beat another BJJ blackbelt, two when he uses a very advance wrestling takedown I had never seen done before in MMA. He almost cripple the guy. I put the move in my own arsenal. It would be the last BJJ blackbelt he beat, BJJ blackbelts, Nate Marquardt and Dan Miller got dominated too.

He showed his true colors on TUF show. He was the most likable guy on the program. I've trained with several guys who have trained with him and they all say he is one of the nicest guys around.

But...As Jon Jones put it, Chael is not a champion in is heart. He doesn't truly believe in his self. He's tough and has a solid skill-set, but that can get you only so far.

Shogun? Well, either Shogun will submit him. (He is underrated as a BJJ player) or Chael will beat him down for 3 round...and maybe submit him.

Don't allow your emotions and Chael's mouth cloud the fight facts. He is one of the best.

Darn straight. Take that, Jake!

Sonnen? He has already made a fool of himself. He was made to look like an amateur in his last fights, and thats because he fought against champions.

Its just outright preposterous the way he acts, while performing so poorly in a real match.

Sonnen is a wrestler that takes wild brutish swings and hopes to land one. That is not boxing. JDS is a boxer. Chael is more of a wrestler, as you can see when he is dazed he goes for the single/double. A common trait of a wrestler.

Backarcher, youre right, he is one of the best, but i dont think he will ever be good enough.

Timber, you have bad taste.

Most people never become champion. Most people don't get to fight for 3 championships with in a 2 year period like Chael did.

Jon Jones would make Anderson Silva look like an ameteur. Look what Jones did to all the former champions of the 205 weight class. He beat Machida so bad nobody wants to see a rematch between the two.

Most fighters don't have a personality when speaking to the media. Frankie Edgar is one of my favorite fighters but he interviews horribly as do most which makes someone like Chael even more interesting.

One of the first ufc fights I ever saw was ufc 117 when Chael almost beat Silva. Up until that point I had a vague idea of who Anderson Ilva was and after that I knew who both fighters were.

"...they can surely handle low impact rolling that begins on the knees and then goes down. Not only is it low impact but it is competitive and gets in a great workout...but still low impact."

It've been saying that for years. All forms of competitive wrestling makes you tough, along with Muay Thai, but it's the training method, not the art.
MMA today is what old vale tude was and what the original BJJ "fighters" train to fight. Today BJJ is more popular than ever, yet the way BJJ is trained today is prep for a 5 minute grappling event with limited grappling rules and no strikes and weak takedowns. Most (non-MMA) gyms train for sport BJJ. That type of training doesn't make you tough. And does not prepare the average blue or purple belt for to fight an angry ex-football player with a couple years of wrestling.


An old Sambo coach once to me the winner of any match will be the one who dominates the most out of 3 areas a)Skill b)toughness c) conditioning

In Anderson's first fight with Chael, Anderson won on toughness, skill.

Weidman beat Anderon via conditioning (mental), toughness (mental) and skill.

I'd beg to differ. In their first fight Chael was tougher and was utilizing his skill set more than Silva was until the last minute of the last round.

Weidman a beat Sipva because George St Pierre didnt want the pressure of everyone asking him every day when he is going to fight Anderson. GSP went up to Weidman and offered him $10 million to beat him saying, "Listen, Chris. I need you to end Solva's hype so my mom stops asking me when I'm going to fight him." Lol

I can't stad Anderson Silva.

The funny thing about Anderson is that the more famous he became the more famous Chael became and vice-versa. The highlight clip of Sonnen manhandling Silva at ufc 117 will never be forgotten as long as Anderson fights. Even his win over Chael at ufc 148 didnt erase the ufc 117 highlight clip.


It's much harder(and unhealthy), than bjj rolling, to go throw for throw and I'm not even talking about sparring.

When analyzing fighters(athletes), I try not to include emotional judgements. Anderson, in my opinion, showed an extreme amount of toughness in that first fight. He was injured and losing over four rounds and could of given up at anytime. He didn't. I really think that's the type of toughness you get in a tough sport like Muay Thai. He stayed calm and composed during his adversity. That's toughness.
Chael broke mentally in Silva's guard. If you look at Chael's career and the fights he lost (which I have) you'll see a pattern. He doesn't fight long in submissions. Excluding the Silva submission, when he loses it's usually in the same round and around the same time. He's even mentioned this himself and admitted seeing a sports psychologist. I just don't think he believes he deserves to be champion. His talk is more about convincing himself than others.

The reason BJJ is such a beautiful art in my opinion is that it doesn't require the type of physical toughness wrestling, judo, boxing and Muay thai does. Which means, you can practice your technique 100% with resistance at any age, any size, any gender and against anyone, and safely. It does require the mental and emotional toughness to be submitted over and over and still come back for more until you get better. The ego of most people cannot handle that.

Old school Gracie JJ did require that physical toughness, along with the mental toughness, for from day one, you trained to "fight"! And against punches, headbutts, gouges....and so on. It wasn't about who could get more advantage points.

Maybe not healthy in today's world, but that change in mindset and training method has effected the success of BJJ in modern MMA and as a self-defense art.

Congrats chael. Great choke!

Darn straight. Hopefully the Shael(Anderson's pronunciation) haters won't start sayin how Shogun is passed his prime.

I was at a wedding and came back just in time to watch the fight. I turned the tv on and it was over. I was surprised because Chael usually fights for all 5 rounds so I though Shogun won till I googled it.