I want to get into kickboxing, but I don't know where to start. Who are the best kickboxers of all time?
What era are you interested in? The full contact Karate centered kickboxing, straight up Muay Thai, or K-1 rules?
If you want to check out of the classic US guys... Don Wilson, Benny Urquidez and Bill Wallace are a good place to start. In the 80s-early 90s there's the Rufus brothers who managed to catch the end of the US KB wave and also compete in the golden age of K-1. Of course there's Maurice Smith who followed a similar path. As for golden age heavyweights in K-1(the area I have the most knowledge in) Peter Aerts, Ernesto Hoost, Andy Hug, Jerome LeBanner, Fransico Filho, Mike Bernardo are hard to top. Lower weight guys that are well regarded include Ramon Deckers, Buakaw Banchamek, Gevorg Petrosyan(known as kickboxing Mayweather) Mike Zambidis(more for his thrilling wars) and John Wayne Parr. In the 2000s you've got a lot of those guys still hanging around with Semmy Schilt, Badr Hari, Stefan Leko, Cro Cop and a couple of others coming into the mix. Any particular division or style you're interested in let me know.... I'll be able to provide better info then.
Fantastic post, sir! Watch the K-1 Max stuff from the 00's. Buakaw vs Masoto II is so f*cking good! Hoost/Sapp, Le Banner/Hunt, some epic fights happened back then.
Even now I can't understand how Hoost managed to lose to Sapp. I thought people were joking when the live results first came the forums.
The 80s PK era of kickboxing was garbage imo terrible ruleset and attire although there were some good fighters who competed in that era like Kaman, Wilson, Alexio, Longinidis etc. To the OP I'd start watching the K1 events starting from the 1st GP in 93, which until the end of the decade marked the strongest era of the sport imo.
As a casual fan its hard to keep track of the best thai fighters always changing there last names when they change gyms etc. but of the fighters I have seen Buakaw who is still going I think was the best Muay Thai and K1 along with Saenchai. Most of the best non thai fighters have been listed and I think Andy Hug was probably the best
Sapp was a roided 350 lb beast who actually cared at that point and got away with a lot of illegal rough house tactics in both fights. The Japanese really loved him at the time and pretty much let him get away with anything.
You're right about the refs letting Sapp do whatever he wanted, in the fight before they they him hit Abidi a million times in the back of the head with no warning. Still the guy had no skills whatsoever and it was supposed to be an easy gp qualifier for a guy who many were considering the 1st or 2nd best HW Kickboxer of alltime.
True, but people forget that Sapp was legit in his prime. Hoost should have kept going to the body and to the legs. But he just fell in love with headhunting Sapp. Those two fights are some of the best I've EVER seen. Japs are usually quiet, but it was like a soccer game in terms of atmosphere! A true mega-fight.
No one could contain his power no matter how skilled or experienced they were at one point. I agree he was a beast. Bit of a black eye for mma I thought at the time, being a football player originally !
I'd say the early American Fullcontact champions like Jeff Smith, Joe Lewis and Demetrius Havanas were pretty good. Troy Dorsey of Dallas, Tx. was a badass kickboxer aside from his pro boxing career. Later followed by Don Wilson, Jerry Rhome, Rick Roufus. As for Europe look for the Dutch fighters like Gilbert Ballentine, Ernesto Hoost and the German WAKO stars Michael Kuhr and Ferdinand Mack. Great technique. I guess the recent K-1 fighters are well known .... but I think Andy Hug of Switzerland was the best.
