Ground and Pound: A fighting technique whereby a practitioner takes their opponent down, controls them, and continually strikes them. This phrase was originally coined by Mark “The Hammer” Coleman.

Speaking of that phrasing by Mark Coleman, how does this sound?. . . “I’m gonna ground and pound the goddamn shit out of him.”

Mark Coleman started his mixed martial arts career with victories over Mati Horenstein (submission via strikes), Gary Goodridge (submission via position), and Don Frye (TKO) on his way to winning the UFC 10 tournament. Then for an encore Coleman went on to beat Julian Sanchez (choke) and Brian Johnston (submission due to strikes) in order to take home the UFC 11 tournament as well. Noticing a pattern in that he won a lot of these early fights via positioning and strikes?

Sounds a lot like—what do you call it?—oh yeah, ground and pound.

Which seems fitting considering Mark Coleman was the first to coin the phrase, “ground and pound,” as we mentioned earlier. But this is a bio. So let’s start closer to the beginning, before there was anything like ground and pound or MMA.

Mark Coleman : The early years in wrestling

Mark Coleman was born in Fremont, Ohio in 1964. As a teenager, he took up an interest in wrestling that continued to flourish at Miami University in Ohio, where he won the Mid-American Conference wrestling championship twice. But as good as things were at Miami, they weren’t good enough for him. Along with this, Coleman transferred to The Ohio State Buckeyes as a senior where he won an NCAA championship.

After college, Mark Coleman, soon to be known as “The Hammer”, gained a spot on the US Olympic Wrestling team, eventually placing 7th at the 1992 Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona.

Interestingly, he continued to wrestle as an amateur during this time period and even defeated Olympic gold medalist Kurt Angle (1995). Angle is perhaps best know for his professional wrestling exploits.

Like so many other wrestlers, though, Coleman wanted to make a buck doing what he loved. But in order for this to happen, he had to transition to a different kind of contact sport.

In other words, he had to start training in mixed martial arts and enter the UFC.

Mark Coleman and the early UFC years

Mark Coleman was a big bruising guy. We’re talking about muscles to burn here. Further, he was intimidating and possessed a nickname that went along with the persona in The Hammer.

In other words, things looked good for him and his vaunted ground and pound from the outset.

After winning UFC 10 and 11 in dominant ground and pound fashion— as was noted in the intro of this piece— the UFC began getting some heat for some of the mismatches they had put on. Thus, they began to experiment with weight classes and championships. Along with this, in his next fight at UFC 12: Judgement Day on February 7, 1997 Mark Coleman took on the popular and well known Dan Severn.

And in only 2:57, Coleman choked his adversary out to win the first UFC Heavyweight Championship. Unfortunately for Coleman—who was beginning to look as dominant as any fighter in the history of the UFC—his next fight wouldn’t be nearly as fun as the ones before it.

Mark Coleman vs. Maurice Smith

Maurice Smith was a championship caliber kickboxer. So what, right? After all, how many stand up fighters had really experienced success in MMA?

Then again, there’s always a first.

In customary style, Coleman charged out and took Smith down. But Smith, who was known to work with Frank Shamrock, employed a highly defensive guard that utilized good positioning and elbows from the bottom to stymie his opponent. Eventually, Coleman tired out from the constant offensive he tried to dish out (ground and pound). And that’s when Smith came alive.

After 21 straight minutes of fighting—regulation plus two overtimes— Coleman’s legs were bruised and battered from low kicks. And for the first time in his career, he was declared the loser via decision.

The fatigue he felt prompted “The Hammer” to take almost one full year off before returning at UFC 17 against Lion’s Den fighter Pete Williams on May 15, 1998. Unfortunately for him, he once again lost, this time by a highlight reel knockout head kick. In fact, Coleman went on to lose two more consecutive fights to Pedro Rizzo and Nobuhiko Takada, the second of which happened in PRIDE. Speaking of PRIDE.

Mark Coleman and his reemergence in the PRIDE Fighting Championships

After losing to Takada, Mark Coleman was at a major crossroads. In fact, his entire career, once looked at as quite promising, was in question. Would he ever be a champion again? Heck, would he ever even win an MMA match again?

Answer to both questions? How about a resounding yes!

On January 30, 2000 PRIDE started their first ever Grand Prix tournament, and Mark Coleman participated. First he defeated Masaaki Satake in the opening round. Then on May 1, 2000 at the finals of the PRIDE Grand Prix 2000, he successively defeated Akira Shoji (decision), Kazuyuki Fujita (TKO), and Igor Vovchanchyn (submission- strikes) to win.

And with that, Coleman’s career was resurrected.

Though Coleman would have only limited success in PRIDE from there forth, losing to Fedor Emelianenko (twice), Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, and Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic ; he would also prove to be the better man while up against Allan Goes, Don Frye, and Mauricio Rua while in the organization.

Mark Coleman and Hammer House

Any bio on Mark Coleman would be remiss to not mention that he is the founder of Team Hammer House, a mixed martial arts team and training facility housed in Columbus, Ohio. Kevin Randleman and Phil Baroni, two well known MMA fighters in their own right, are teammates there.

Brock Lesnar vs. Mark Coleman

At UFC 82 on March 1, 2008, Mark Coleman was given a very deserved honor. Namely, he was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame. On top of that, another major announcement was made.

The Hammer would not be retiring after all. Rather, he would be coming back to the Octagon to face former Division I National Champion wrestler, Brock Lesnar, in August.

So here’s the question: Can Coleman defeat Brock Lesnar, a younger man with a deep desire to make it in MMA and a similar skill set (but bigger and perhaps stronger)? Hard to say.

But we do know this. . . If you saw Mark Coleman in his last fight against Fedor Emelianenko, well, you know that his heart is still in this game. That means something. So to count him out against a very talented fighter with much less experience might not be wise.

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References

Sherdog

Urban Dictionary

Wikipedia