Bruce Baumgartner on MMA
Olympic wrestler not big UFC fan Four-time Olympic wrestling medalist Bruce Baumgartner instructed young wrestlers Friday at the Sentinels World…
Olympic wrestler not big UFC fan
Four-time Olympic wrestling medalist Bruce Baumgartner instructed young wrestlers Friday at the Sentinels World Class Summer Clinic hosted by the Evangelical Christian School Wrestling Club.
During the lunch break, Baumgartner discussed the up-and-coming sport of mixed martial arts and its top organization – the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
“I’m not what I would say is a big fan, but I don’t mind watching a match here and there,” Baumgartner said. “It’s an avenue from when kids get out of college that they can use some of the skills that they have learned in wrestling.
“The problem I see with any professional sport is that there are thousands of high school and college graduates trying to be (UFC fighter) Randy Couture.
“But those guys are one in 10,000.”
Baumgartner compared trying to make it in the UFC to trying to gain a spot on the Olympic team or trying to make it in the NFL.
“There just aren’t that many spots available (in the UFC),” said Baumgartner, who is America’s only four-time Olympic wrestling medalist. “A lot of kids try to do it out of college for two or three years then you don’t see them anymore. They might be better off just spending a year on it and if they don’t make it moving on before they become physical impaired.”
After winning the 1982 NCAA championship in his senior year at Indiana State, Baumgartner said he had offers from professional wrestling, pro football and the original no-holds-barred Ultimate Fighting Championship, but declined them to pursue his Olympic dreams.
It paid off as Baumgartner won two Olympic gold medals, one silver and a bronze. He was voted into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 2008.
Couture and UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar won NCAA wrestling championships before embarking on their mixed martial arts careers.
“Those guys are incredibly hard workers,” Baumgartner said. “Anybody who wins a national championship is. I don’t know that there’s many of the mixed martial arts guys who know how to train like the guys who were very good college wrestlers. Those guys have a little bit of an advantage over the kids who just came from high school.
“Brock Lesnar, unless he’s changed … he’s a stud. He’s a thoroughbred.”
Baumgartner also said that if today’s UFC were an option for him coming out of college in 1982 that he would have probably declined.
“I am a wrestling guy,” said Baumgartner, who is the athletic director at Edinboro (Pa.) University. “I really loved wrestling. I never picked up on anything else.”
ECS wrestling coach Jeff Malavsky also brought in two-time NCAA champion Damion Hahn, two-time All-American Mike Rogers and brothers Ricky and Rocky Bonomo to help teach at this week’s camp.
This is the fourth consecutive year of the ECS event, which had more than 50 campers this year.
“Wrestling is a growing sport and I think that it is important for these kids to learn from the best,” Malavsky said. “We want to give the kids locally an opportunity to learn without having to travel too far.”
