Beyond the Fight 03.28.08: Hype or Legend?

Posted by Sergio G. Hernandez on 03.28.2008

He sells hundreds of tickets and is a major star in two organizations. He’s rumored to have fights against Robbie Lawler, Tito Ortiz, and Ken Shamrock in the works. The fighters he has beaten since the turn of the century barely muster a combined .500 record. He hasn’t fought a top 10 fighter in nearly a decade. Why is Frank Shamrock one of the most talked about fighters in MMA?

Tomorrow night, live on Showtime, Frank Shamrock will step into the cage opposite Cung Le in a Strikeforce/EliteXC co-promoted event.

This, in many fans' opinion, will be the first real test Shamrock has faced since September of 1999.

To understand Frank Shamrock, you have to understand the mind of a businessman. And Frank is the epitome of a mixed martial arts businessman. Long before Randy Couture was disputing contracts and speaking out about bonuses, Shamrock was the quintessential MMA renegade.

His career started by proxy, one of several young men taken in by Bob Shamrock. His older "brother," Ken taught him the ropes of submission grappling, which parlayed into an invitation to the Pancrase fighting organization in Japan.

He made an instant impression, defeating Bas Rutten in his debut fight. Rutten would end up avenging this loss but Shamrock would continue on and gain victories over Vernon White, Minoru Suzuki, and the legendary pioneer Masakatsu Funaki. His submission victory over Suzuki earned him an "interim" King of Pancrase title while Rutten was sidelined with an injury. Shamrock was definitely making a name for himself.

Rutten, however, returned and defeated Shamrock to unify the King of Pancrase titles. Shamrock seemed to falter after this, dropping three of his next four bouts. While his adoptive brother, Ken, was fighting in the American-based UFC and about to jump into the lucrative world of professional wrestling, Frank's career seemed stalled in Japan.

That all changed in December of 1997 when SEG's Ultimate Fighting Championship brought him in to face Olympic gold medallist Kevin Jackson to crown their under 200 pound division champ. Sixteen seconds into their bout, Frank Shamrock became UFC's first light heavyweight champion.

What began at that point was a near two-year domination of every contender UFC put in front of Shamrock. He slammed Igor Zinoviev into retirement, outlasted a very game Jeremy Horn and quickly avenged a loss to John Lober.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Tito Ortiz was coming off a three-fight win streak, capped off with TKO victory over former Shamrock teammate Guy Mezger. The stage was set for UFC 22: Only One Can Be Champion.

In what many consider to be one of the best pre-Unified Rules bouts in MMA history, Shamrock outlasted Ortiz into the fourth round, gaining a TKO victory over the future light heavyweight champion. In respect, Ortiz donned a Frank Shamrock t-shirt after the fight.

Frank Shamrock should have been the world's biggest MMA star at that point. Unfortunately for him, the company which owned UFC at the time, Semaphore Entertainment Group, was hemorrhaging money which led to what is now known by fans as the UFC "Dark Ages."
Enter Frank Shamrock, the businessman.

Not wanting to fight for the peanuts a non-pay per view event promised and concerned about the UFC's uncertain future, Shamrock all but begged Japanese promotion Pride Fighting Championship for a contact a scant three months before his historic bout with Ortiz. It seemed that Shamrock could read the writing on the wall and wanted to ensure his future in the sport in addition to his financial stability.

No contract from Pride FC came. SEG began to falter. Shamrock retired.

He took on Elvis Sinosic in an MMA match for the K-1 promotion at the end of 2000 and fought perennial can Shannon Ritch in a kickboxing bout but beyond that, Shamrock was a memory inside of a cage or ring. He branched out into acting and began commentating for UFC events. It seemed that at his peak, Frank Shamrock had outgrown mixed martial arts.

Sometime between UFC 32 and 33, a falling out between Zuffa/Dana White and Shamrock occurred. The details of which, even I am not sure of. If anyone has any insight, please feel free to let me know. I do know the ramifications of said fallout were that Frank's name was never mentioned again during a UFC broadcast.
UFC's first middleweight/light heavyweight champion had all but been erased from the record books.
Frank Shamrock slipped into the "What If?" section of MMA, a fighter seemingly ahead of his time; comfortable on his feet but could also get the takedown and submit an opponent on the mat. A one-off match against nobody Bryan Pardoe in 2003 did nothing to change that.

But in 2006, that all changed. The Ultimate Fighting Championship, fresh off the success of The Ultimate Fighter and the close-to household names of Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture, Matt Hughes, and Rich Franklin began gaining heat in the mainstream. It seemed mixed martial arts, a sport that seemed destined for greatness but floundered under political scrutiny, had finally hit it big. Riding the UFC's coattails were a number of organizations, hoping to get it's cut into the pie.

One of them was Strikeforce.

Strikeforce immediately staked a claim in the MMA landscape by signing former WWE star Daniel Puder, lightweight standout Gilbert Melendez, San Shou artist Cung Le, and Frank Shamrock.
Shamrock was, in what seemingly has become standard in his post-UFC fighting career, placed against Cesar Gracie, an untested, unranked fighter whose only worth in the main event was a famous last name.
Shamrock won in 21 seconds over the 0-0 Gracie. Since then, Shamrock lost via disqualification to Renzo Gracie and gained a submission victory over Phil Baroni.

Neither fight lived up to the "legend" moniker Shamrock gave himself when he defeated Pardoe.

Which brings me to Saturday. Shamrock faces off against his toughest challenge this century when he faces off against Cung Le. While Le is only a year younger than Shamrock, he doesn't have the wear and tear Shamrock has as a result of his time in the Japanese circuit and his early UFC tenure. Shamrock, reportedly, has blown out knees which Le could easily take advantage of. Shamrock's only hope of victory is taking this fight to the ground. His takedowns, as of late, have looked less than stellar and a proper defense on Le's part could easily neutralize this game plan.

I predict a TKO victory for Le in the third round.

Being a fan of the sport since 1996, I have waited and yearned for a fighter to transcend the sport. For a Babe Ruth, a Muhammad Ali, a Michael Jordan. Chuck Liddell came close before being exposed as a wrestler-killer by Quinton Jackson.

At one point, I thought it might be Frank Shamrock. He had it all: the look, the skill set, and the personality to put himself above and beyond, to transcend the sport. But he quit.

Now, almost a decade after his historic fight with Ortiz, it seems to be too little, too late. I can't imagine a fight against pound-for-pound king Anderson Silva that doesn't end with Silva's arm being raised. A Shamrock/Silva bout will just about be impossible to put together, though. And despite a recent interview with Shamrock where he states he would like to throw down with the UFC middleweight champ, his history of taking easy fights with huge paydays speaks more voluminous than his words.