Stories From the Road: Frank Shamrock
Unspoken Codes
How does one catch a 190-pound Shamrock soaring through the air? Rutten did not have the world’s largest catcher’s mitt.
“I’m not a small guy,” Shamrock said. “We were jumping from an eight-foot stage, enough where guys had a hard time climbing back up and needed a lot of help. We were 10, 12 feet flying through the air --these human projectiles. It wasn’t pretty, but this was my first concert I ever went to, and I didn’t have a point of reference. I thought this is what you always do at rock concerts. Pancrase was a small, intimate group where we went everywhere with each other. Thank God Bas was there. So I jumped. I was around 190 pounds then, but still, a 190-pound missile will smash you if it lands on top of you with any kind of force. When I did it, everyone just scattered because they saw what happened when Bas landed.
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“Then we just picked up the poor Japanese guy Bas knocked out,” Shamrock added. “Bas shook him over his head, and we passed him on to the crowd. We just kept dancing and partying on. Bas and I talk about that night all of the time. I spent my life incarcerated, part of it in institutions and part of it in prison. I got out, and within six months, I’m in Japan training to fight. You can’t make that stuff up. It happened. My life had existed only being locked up, institutionalized, and I’m stage diving with Bas Rutten and Biohazard in Japan. It was a night-and-day transformation from what my life was a year before. It’s why it’s something I’ll never forget.”
Dealing with Tanked-Up Tank
One of weirdest eras in MMA came in the mid-1990s. It was a time when many fighters just made up things as they went along, sans formal training and genuine fighting technique, as most MMA fighters have today. It was a time when David Abbott ruled. Shamrock was there when “Tank” Abbott burst onto the scene, stopping John Matua in a mere 20 seconds at UFC 6 on July 14, 1995.
“Tank knocked out Matua, mocked him and then became a star; and I remember I was watching it, thinking, ‘This is insane; someone is going to die,’” Shamrock said. “When Matua seized up and Abbott mocked him, I thought the crowd for certain was going to be negative, and they couldn’t have been happier. They couldn’t have cheered more. I was completely shocked. Bob Meyrowitz, the old president of the UFC, was standing right next to me, and he turns and goes, ‘We’ve got a star!’ That was the beginning of Tank Abbott.
“Then I got to meet him,” he continued. “After a fight in Buffalo, New York, I had this very attractive girlfriend and we used to go to all of the shows together. After the Buffalo show, we went to the after party. Tank was there. He was already liquored up, and he moseys over and puts his arm around me, takes his teeth out and says, ‘Listen, if that gorgeous girl doesn’t take you home, I’ll take you home and suck your [expletive] tonight!’ It broke up into a total fight, and they asked us both to leave. Tank likes to shock people. I started to get elevated, and I was looking at him like, ‘What are you talking about?’ That’s when security came right on top of us. I think they were looking at Tank anyway. He was already brewing to cause trouble.
“I was there the time Wallid Ismail knocked him out after UFC 13,” Shamrock added. “Tank slid across the floor into a corner sleeping. We were already getting drunk at the after party. Wallid smoked him. You had to see it. Tank would get totally wasted, and he would either love you or try and pick a fight with you. One day he loved me, and I was the greatest guy ever, and the next, he hated me for whatever. The last time I spoke to Tank we were fine, because I beat up Tito.”
Wacky Times in Brazil
John Lober had to get himself charged up to take on Shamrock at UFC 17.5 on Oct. 16, 1998 inside a janky arena known as the Portuguesa Gymnasium in Sao Paulo, Brazil. There was a history between the two. Lober had beaten Shamrock by split decision at a SuperBrawl event on Jan. 17, 1997. However, there was something different this time. Shamrock had made a marked improvement in a year, and Lober, sensing this, knew he was in trouble for their rematch.
Again, this was a far different UFC than we know today. There was no advanced scouting to check where the fighters would be staying. Rumors continued to swirl that that UFC was struggling and MMA was a dying sport, that there was no money in it. As such, the accommodations for UFC 17.5 ended up on prostitute row in Sao Paulo, where each night a thousand prostitutes would hang outside hotel headquarters for the fight card. Making matters even less tranquil for Shamrock was dealing with Lober.
“He sent me dirty emails that had stuff in it like, ‘I’m going to strangle you like JonBenet Ramsey,’ because this was during that time period -- some real terrible stuff,” Shamrock said. “I thought that crossed the line a little bit. It wasn’t anything personal, nothing like picking on my mom. It was John’s way of getting himself up and staying in the game. He ordered room service to my room at 4 a.m., calling my room in the middle of the night and hanging up, ordering sheets for me at 4 a.m. -- all kinds of stuff. When it happened three, four nights straight, waking me from a sound sleep, then it started to get a little annoying.
“He knew I was going to annihilate him,” he added. “I had progressed 100 times past the time we were when we first fought. He beat me at SuperBrawl 3; he totally beat me back in the era of the 20-minute and 30-minute round. He beat me pretty good in the first five minutes, and I got tired. I didn’t prepare for it. I was on my beer-and-oatmeal diet back then. He beat me and stayed the same. I kept moving forward. I was level 10 and he was level 1.5, and he knew it. It’s why he had to do everything humanly possible to win.”
Shamrock punched Lober into submission at 7:40 of the first round.
“I didn’t take anything he did very funny. I beat the hell out of him,” Shamrock said. “At the time, I was so mad. The best part was when I finally knocked him down and pushed him in a corner and beat him down. He said, ‘That’s good, I’ve had enough.’ He was looking for compassion, and I was so mad. I said, ‘I’m going to [expletive] kill you.’ I was yelling at him, and Maurice Smith, who was in my corner, is laughing at me because it was so out of character for me.
“So after the fight, I saw John in the airport,” he added. “He was sitting hunched over in a corner, all quiet among a bunch of chairs. I came over and stood above him looking down. He had this gash going across his forehead that he needed 17 stitches for, the poor guy. It happened because I was punching his head into the cage. It just split open. When he looked up at me, to be totally honest, I felt bad, because he’s never going to look the same again. I wanted to say something, and right as I was about to speak, he goes, ‘Bro, I’m so sorry for what I put you through. It’s what I had to do to get myself up. It wasn’t personal.’ Instantly, everything just melted. I had to let it go.”
The unspoken code of warriors kicked in.
Fighting a Friend
One of the biggest challenges of Shamrock’s career was taking on the legendary Rutten three times, not only because of Rutten’s skills but because Rutten was the first genuine MMA fighter that befriended Shamrock. Rutten won two of the three meetings, but the encounters made Shamrock a better fighter. On occasion, Rutten will bring up the fight he lost to Shamrock, never the two that he won.
“We fought three times, and they were always so hard, physically, mentally, emotionally,” Shamrock said. “You knew with Bas, unlike the other foreigners, you had to train to win. Anytime I fought for Pancrase, I didn’t train as hard because I didn’t think I had to. Technically, I could take the month off and just stay in shape. Bas was different. Bas was so tough. You had to train to win, because Bas was so skilled technically, so mentally tough, so mean and so willing to win. You were always going get hurt trying to fight Bas. Those were the times I truly had to work.
“Plus, Bas was my first real friend from the MMA world, and he was also my first professional fight,” he added. “We used to party down and hang out. Bas is one of the true, really, really good guys in the sport. I love Bas. I would always look forward to going to Japan just to see him. That’s how highly I think of him. I beat Bas on pure technique the first time we fought, and I didn’t know anything about fighting other than to block strikes, get people down and go through submissions. I’m not the kind of guy that will remind Bas that I beat him the first time, but Bas forgets nothing. We still laugh about it today when I see him. You always remember the losses. You never remember the wins. He’s a fighter, and every fighter feels that way.
Memories linger.
“About five years ago, I was in Hawaii,” Shamrock said. “Bas was there selling the bracelets and stuff that he makes. I was so excited to see him that I had to say hi. Within five minutes, he says he wonders how different his life would be if he knocked me out that first time we fought. Then every 10 minutes, he circled back and told me he wondered what would have happened if he landed that right hand. It’s been 20 years since we fought, and Bas was still thinking about that moment. He remembers the time he lost, not the two times he beat me, but that’s the warrior’s mentality and that’s Bas -- a true warrior.
“There was one time we got a day off from Pancrase, and we decided to go to the emperor’s palace,” he added. “This place had these huge walls, and Bas wanted to climb them. I told him, ‘Bas, I don’t think it’s a good idea,’ but there’s Bas climbing 30 feet up the emperor’s palace walls and he’s doing these sidekicks in the air and screaming for me to take a picture of him. By then, the police were mobilizing to come and get us. That’s Bas. You never have a dull time around him. I still have pictures of him climbing the royal walls doing sidekicks.”
Joy of the Game
Like all of the pioneers and legends that came before today’s stars, Shamrock shares the same mentality about MMA: You did it because you loved it.
“There was a far greater camaraderie between guys back then, because MMA was a much smaller world,” Shamrock said. “The money wasn’t as great, and through time, you form friendships because guys had to live together. To me, it was a good time. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we had a lot of fun. Everything was new then. I was a nerd. I could tell guys were making things up and just pretending to be fighters, as opposed to the guys that were really studying and taking martial arts seriously. It’s what I always did.
“It’s why for me, you appreciate and understand each time you fight, the other guy went through the same stuff I did,” he added. “It’s why you have respect for your opponent. It’s why I respect anyone who stands up and fights. I also think today’s fighters are great. You see the progression of the athletes and their technical skills. There are a few guys putting their brand together on the mic, guys like Conor McGregor. They understand we’re all here to entertain and the entertainment just happens to be fighting. I’ll admit, I thought the technical aspect of the sport would have grown quicker, but I thought that for a long time. I’m pleased where the sport is. It has international awareness.
MMA pulled Shamrock out of the gutter and gave him a life he never could have imagined.
“Personally, without MMA, I wouldn’t be where I am,” he said. “I needed a good life program to live by. The education I received as a youth was going to jail. That education doesn’t get you very far, nor makes you successful. I did it so my son, Frank, would never have to fight in a cage for money. I did it so my daughter, Nicolette, can sing and act and do voiceovers and become a star someday without ever getting punched in the face; but I do believe in the core principles of martial arts. It changed and saved my life.”
Joseph Santoliquito is the president of the Boxing Writer's Association of America and a frequent contributor to Sherdog.com's mixed martial arts and boxing coverage. His archive can be found here.
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