Bruce Lee in MMA? Chinese fighter Xu Xiaodong criticises martial arts icon’s legendary Long Beach ‘performance’
- Lee considered ‘the father of mixed martial arts’ but Xu Xiaodong says famous Long Beach demonstration shows no real combat techniques
- ‘Mad Dog’ critiques Lee’s use of protective gear and sparring with students
It seems no one is safe from Chinese mixed martial arts fighter Xu Xiaodong’s war on “fake kung fu” – not even Bruce Lee.
Since the rise in popularity of MMA, many have speculated how martial arts icon and Hollywood legend Lee would have fared in modern combat situations.
MMA did not exist in the Enter the Dragon star’s 1960s and ’70s heyday, but UFC president Dana White has called him “the father of mixed martial arts”.
Lee himself rejected traditional martial arts, developing Jeet Kune Do as a philosophy of simplifying things and eliminating the “fancy mess that distorts and cramps their practitioners and distracts them from the actual reality of combat”.
But the outspoken “Mad Dog” Xu has offered a critique of Lee’s legendary sparring footage from Long Beach, California, in 1964, which some have pointed to as evidence that Lee could have competed in MMA.
“I say whatever I want and everyone hates me. Everyone wants to fight me so I don’t care,” Xu said in a video post on social media, according to a translation by YouTube channel Fight Commentary Breakdowns.