Ray Pina wants to fight

[Ray Pina]

"Secret" defense or not, when I fight, sometimes I hit the ground sometimes I don't. Sometimes I hit the ground and get back up. Sometimes I hit the ground, get back up, and then there I am on the ground again only to get back up. Sometimes I tap.

Who knows how it will go?

[Ray Pina]

Just invested in a camera and a computer ..... it wasn't cheap and I'm not rich.

I intend for these matches to be full contact no gear .... in other words, we'll be going very hard. In other words, intend to win. And if that's the case $500 is nothing.

The reason I've adopted this policy is because there are lots of people who want to play patty-cake and later claim this or that. Make it serious and make it worth something. This cuts right to the chase.*


*(mouth pieces and cups are acceptable gear)

[red5angel]

sounds fair to me, I think you're going to be hard pressed to find takers for 500$ but otherwise a solid idea.

[MasterKiller]

I dunno. It just sounds like BS to me. You often say you'll fight anyone anywhere, and are constantly asking for peope here to step up. But then you throw in this $500-with-no-gloves thing like you're some professional Street Fighter.

I'm sure you're serious about it. But what gives? Either you'll play with anyone or you won't. To me, it really just sounds like a cop out. It almost reads like a mini-version of Ashida Kim's challenge.

If you're that serious about being a fighter and you're obviously confident in your abilities, I would think you'd welcome any fight, anytime, just for the experience.

[Ray Pina]

You see MasterKiller, everything is relative.

It's easy for you to say from the safety of your computer. But it's me who's putting my health on the line. It's me who can get the busted nose, coller bone, arm quite easily .... then what?

The $500 is an insurance policy for me. You see, there's a million guys like you who get real agressive in their speech on the internet and point the finger and have a million things to say .... I'm not worried about you. You never show up.

It's your friend's friend who has trained something. Or your big bouncer friend who's tough as $hit. That's who I'm worried about. How many real tough fights does one have in him? How much of this can I afford? I don't know. But $500 makes it worth my time and their's too see and I get to compile footage. It makes it more serious, something to consider before saying, "Come on down."

Of course, I'm tempermental enough to say to someone like you who is insulting me in a round-about-way (even with the safety of the web) that we can fight at the most convenient time for both of us for free ...... but we tried that already didn't we?

This type of thing is not for you. Don't worry about it.

[MasterKiller]

but we tried that already didn't we?

Did we? I remember you flying to Houston and wanting to play, then getting mad when I wouldn't drive 8 hours to accomodate you. If that was a fight challenge, then I guess it went over my head.

But it's me who's putting my health on the line. It's me who can get the busted nose, coller bone, arm quite easily .... then what?

But it's also you who keeps throwing out the hook. How many times have you ASKED people to step up? That's what I'm getting at. You ask for it, then add the *. It just seems contradictory.

All I'm saying is, the guys on here who fight all the time, and who have the most skill like MP and 7* never attach these kinds of disclaimers. If they want a full contact fight they get into the ring and they've got one, for less than $500 I might add.

You've already stated you are 18 months from making a big splash in the ring and won't fight in the ring until then. So what gives with the open internet challenge?

If people are openly challenging you, I could understand you saying, OK, I'll settle it, but with these terms. But, from my end, it looks like you are the one opening the can. Doesn't make sense to me.

I'm not worried about you. You never show up.

More power to you, Ray. I just don't buy it.

This type of thing is not for you. Don't worry about it.

Guess I'm just not hardcore like you.

But then again, no one else here has stepped up to meet the Ray Pina $500 challenge, so maybe I'm not the oddball here.

[Ray Pina]

Please understand this MasterKiller, my requirements are to save everyone time.

I just went to a "Throwdown" and nobody wanted to do full contact. Or someone says they want to cross hands, but then no this or no that. That's fine. That's their thing and I went on my own.

If some guys are getting together and playing under certain rules you have to play their game ..... I've been doing that for sometime now. Now I'm setting up a situation where I can play under conditions that favor my style of fighting. That's all. It's no big deal.

As for training, what you do with your training partners is your business. Good luck.

[red5angel]

Ray, MK has some good points. In the history of the arts ,there has been a lot of fighting for the sake of fighting without the need for money. I think if you make it clear you want to fight, set some basic ground rules and see who comes your way. You're not going to get many people who want to go for 500$. Hell, I like to fight but not for 500$ I don't train enough to put that much money on the line. If you do then you probably need to start looking at more official venues where a little money can be made.

It just seems weird to some people cause you're itching to fight and prove yourself, or atleast challenge yourself but you set up some pretty hefty roadblocks. There's the whole issue of fighting officially, you can't for reasons you're teacher has laid down. You'll fight someone in a free for all NHB style match but only if they put up 500$, something you're probably more apt to find if you hunt hard enough in your part of the country. I think it throws people cause you seem to want to really get in and do it but some of your qualifiers are pretty high.

[WanderingMonk]

Ray,

Your goal to sharpen up your skills before bring your art out in the open is admirable. except, I don't think your approach will be the most efficient way of achieving your goal.

You will get some takers and you'll be able to really test out some of your skills. but, how many of them can you realistically expect? 5? 10? over a year time?

If you join a MMA/san da circuit, you'll have some assurance on how many time you can fight a fully resisting opponent.

[Mutant]

Ray, first off, no disrespect, you try to keep it real for CMA and aren't afraid to throw down and i respect that, and i think you have good intentions. I just want to comment on youre open challenge and lack of format or rules. If it works out for you than cool, and i hope it does.

I have a few issues to bring up, which may relate to why nobody has taken you up on your challenge...
If youre serious about embarking on a successful long-term fight career, you may want to rethink your format for issuing challenge fights. Personally under your requirements, I doubt you'll get many (if any) takers. If you do, I think you will only get crazies or shady fighters who you'd have to worry about using extra-dirty tactics. Then you'd have to ask yourself if youre willing to put your life on the line for some fight experience or street cred. I don't care how skilled or unskilled someone is; if they were going to fight under your (lack of) rules, not knowing the person and not having a good ref or format, you'd have to be willing to seriously maim or possibly kill each other and anything less would be underestimating them or just luck. Even if you win, they may get p1ssed off and decide to knife you. Or what if somebody sees it as an invitation to show up knowing you have $500 on you and no cops around, shoot you, and walk away with easy money. You don't know what kind of psycho youre going to run into... Under those rules, I would try to take somebody the f#ck out, or not get into it at all. And thats just not worth it for most people that have jobs, family, aspirations to be in good health for real competitions, and who worry about getting sued or prosecuted. This isnt ancient China and a lot of people don't understand or respect any kind of martial code.

I understand your frustration and attempt to level the playing field for your game, and it is true that there are a lot of one-trick-pony grapplers out there who don't want to acknowlege or face how much it changes their perceived dominance when they take real shots and find someone harder to take down than their used to... but the end result i believe is that you'll get less useful experience, that will have little relevance to MMA format, which is your stated goal anyway (i think)... Because decent up and coming MMA fighters who may want to try you out probably won't fight under those rules anyway. They want to stay healthy and train. If i was going to fight with no rules, i'd at least want a good ref and medics around, anything else is a streetfight, against someone better trained than youre likely to encounter in an actual street fight. Maybe you'll get a Kimbo Slice or someone more skilled and dangerous and you'll both end up in the hospital (or possibly worse if they pull out a razor or don't respect a tap) and then where is your fight career? You may be unable to train if you sustain serious injuries which can set back your real progress and ring career. It sucks missing potential training time or a ring fight because of injuries, I certainly know about that... And you'd get much better quality people if you agree to MMA rules and gear, because most others probably won't want to risk ruining their career or training either, and the few who do will likely be turned off buy putting up 500 bucks in a situation that sounds like a possible ambush. Plus you'll get used to winning using the format and gear that you'd be fighting with in the future anyway. MMA gloves arent that restrictive, and do you really want to get hit full blast with bare knuckles and elbows by a trained fighter, or risk busting your own hand? Even good fighters are going to take hits...

Unless you are just doing it this way to gain notoriety or reputation and not counting on having any real takers, than thats a whole other issue...

[lkfmdc]

Sorry to be blunt, but this is a really stupid thread.....

You want to train with partners and do a lot of sparring, join a school that spars. This isn't a mystery kids. It isn't hard to figure out...

This talk of no gloves and $500 smacks of the fluff and smoke BS that we make so much fun of

sorry, but that's the way I see it....

[Mutant]

Besides Ray, you only made it through a round and a half of your only sanctioned ring fight, what makes you think youre going make it through a fight with no rounds, refs or rules? Better to save it for the gym.

[lkfmdc]

sounds a lot like what we did back in Dave's TCMA class in the 80's - I recall we went at it pretty hard, no pads, just about anything goes, and we were really trying to hit each other, hard (with love, of course) - I remember learning how to deal with and become very comfortable using knees and elbows, and how to work from long range to the floor very fluidly

It's fun that guys like Chris are still around to remember stuff like that

That training "worked" because we had 10 dedicated guys in a room every weekend for several hours at a shot. Strangely, it was always TEN, we never got the group larger than that. Some might leave to be replaced by others, always bringing the group back to TEN...

But that was exactly my point, what Mr Pina needs to do is find a school like this, NOT have $500 bare knuckle challenges

[Elliott_Hall]

This needs to be made clear because the confusion is starting again -

David Bond Chan's E-chuan is not the same thing as Wang XiangZhai's Yiquan/i-chuan.

[Mutant]

- I recall we went at it pretty hard, no pads, just about anything goes, and we were really trying to hit each other, hard (with love, of course) -

And I wasnt suggesting that you NEED tons of gear to practice kung fu and go at it real hard (although good gear can sure be nice:-) , in fact i think its important to practice without gear too. My point was just that going NO GEAR, FULL OUT, with someone you DON'T know or have a level of understanding with, in an unknown situation with a possible loose-cannon who's fighting for 500 smackers, things could get real UGLY real quick.

Of course do what you want and good luck with it. There just seems to be an illogical descrepency between your goal and your best method of reaching it.