When mixed martial arts trainers discuss the inner workings of the still-evolving sport, many will break down fighters and techniques with the precision of an expert diamond cutter, but only one man will quote General George Sherman or relate a move to a symphony by Bach.
Greg Jackson, a 32-year-old MMA savant from Albuquerque, New Mexico, brings a different dimension to something that seems to be finding its foothold in the cluttered sports world.
Jackson is a rare breed amongst people who eat, live and breathe MMA; he is equally at ease talking philosophy and physics as he is discussing armbars and triangle chokes.
At the moment, he is also one of the most sought after trainers in MMA, sporting a roster of fighters featured on top promotions around the world.
"They are really, really great athletes," Jackson said of his camp. "I got into this to work with amazing artists, so I am just lucky that they consider me able to help them out and it's a real honor to do so."
One such Jackson-partisan is UFC light heavyweight contender
Rashad Evans (Pictures), who fights
Tito Ortiz (Pictures) this Saturday in Sacramento, Calif.
"He's been a great help," said Evans, a student of Jackson's after a successful run on
The Ultimate Fighter reality show. "I don't think I would be where I am as a fighter without Greg. He keeps taking my training to new places."
Hearing about the unorthodox training methods and witnessing their undeniable results, Evans decided he had to check it out the New Mexico camp for himself at the behest of TUF cast-mate and fellow Jackson disciple
Keith Jardine (Pictures).
He soon realized what all the hype was about.
"Greg's a genius," explained the undefeated Evans. "He's always innovating, always thinking about new ways for you to destroy your opponent. He's on the cutting edge."
Words like generous, passionate, logical and intelligent litter the conversation when his fighters speak about the kid from the wrong side Albuquerque with "pretty hardcore" hippy parents.
Born in Washington D.C., Jackson, moved with his family to New Mexico just before his third birthday and was raised in the Quaker tradition, which stressed a "pacifistic ideology from day one."
"I was blessed with a real intellectual upbringing," Jackson said. "My parents read to us every night; we didn't have a TV until I was 12. They were just a real good set of parents. I was raised in a bad neighborhood with a really good family."
Jackson's father, an Ivy League-educated activist for the disabled, and Jim Dudley, a professor at the nearby University of New Mexico whom the trainer considers a "second father," piqued his interest in concepts ranging from classical philosophy to theoretical physics, and instilled a belief that critical thinking and self-education were cornerstones of a successful life.
"They really helped shape me with an intellectual curiosity about the world," said Jackson. "You know, if I was asking about chaos theory and how it would shape a mountain, they would walk me through it."
For the quirky self-styled bookworm it's been, as one Jackson friend described, a "15-year overnight success" in creating a MMA stronghold nestled in the foothills of the Sandia Mountains.
He came from a family steeped in wrestling tradition and trained in martial arts from an early age. When he was 17, Jackson felt it was time to pass on that knowledge and opened his first school. From there it was a ton of hard work and his trademark innovation that built Jackson the following that now pays the bills a whole lot better than it once did.
Jackson refuses to take any training fees from his professional fighters, remembering the days when he lived off bologna sandwiches in his heat-deficient gym. Yet with the notoriety garnered from training so many top mixed martial artists, his academy has prospered.
"He is truly generous and he never asks anything in return for all his hard work and dedication," said
Nathan Marquardt (Pictures), who will challenge for the UFC middleweight title Saturday with Jackson in his corner.
Eventually Jackson's love affair with traditional martial arts lost its luster when he began to see its shortcomings on the street, though he admits those shortcomings were "probably because I'm not that great a fighter."
It was around that time that Jackson picked up a book on judo, and saw a
Sankaku, a triangle-armbar combination.
"Oh, I thought that was the coolest thing I'd ever seen," he said, acting as if he'd just discovered the Rosetta Stone. "So I played around with that one a little bit. And then the Ultimate Fighting Championship came out and man, the Gracies were light years ahead of where I was. Oh my God. Right away, there was no one in New Mexico to teach me so I started developing it from there. It's just physics and geometry. It is real simple stuff when you break it down."
This is where Jackson's critical thinking and self-education come into focus.
"The thing you have to understand is there are underlying principles that govern everything -- that's physics," he said. "If you understand that, there's also underlying axioms of combat that govern everything. Once you tap into that, once you say, ‘I need to get leverage. How am I going to get leverage? OK, I'm going to go to 90-degrees to get good leverage.' Just the basic of the basics. When you do that, you're opening up a whole new realm, especially on the ground."
Building on the Gracies' Brazilian jiu-jitsu, Jackson tapped into his knowledge of physics and geometry as well as wrestling and traditional martial arts and began the innovative style that we see on display when his fighters take to the cage or ring today.
"The thing that makes Greg so different is it's all Greg," said UFC welterweight contender
Diego Sanchez (Pictures). "He is the guy that comes up with all these things on his own. No one else does things the way he does; he is a spiritual teacher."
Jackson's ability to make connections between fighting and other art forms -- yes, to him fighting is an art -- has been a huge key. Whether it is classical music or military tactics, the trainer seems able to draw a comparison from almost everything.
"Fundamental axioms govern everything that has to do with rhythm, and fighting has to do with rhythm," he said. "There are lots of people who do this, but Bach just happens to be my favorite. He will take a cannon of music and invert it; it is just like fighting."
"‘Keep them on the horns of a dilemma,' like General Sherman said. That's how I would describe our style," claimed the military history buff.
To do that Jackson and his fighters must, like everyone else in the ever-evolving sport, continue developing new ways to win.
"Every time I think I've got [this sport] nailed down, it's like, ooh, then there's like six new things that people give me and I'm like ‘that's amazing, that's amazing.' So it's, I just love it to death. There's not anything else I would want to do with my day."
That's good, because he may not have much time to do anything else these days as fighters continue to flock to his doorstep. It is both a blessing and a curse. Jackson has been inundated with requests to help people and he feels his ability to focus on the needs of his top students has suffered as a result.
There have been a number of high-profile losses for Jackson students over the last few months -- Sanchez's first professional loss; Jardine going down to
Houston Alexander (Pictures);
Georges St. Pierre (Pictures) falling in a big upset to
Matt Serra (Pictures); and
Joey Villasenor (Pictures) dropping his last fight -- yet the trainer is always looking to defend his fighters by taking responsibility for their hardships.
"I was getting a little overextended with all the people and a lot of stuff going on," he said. "Not to make any excuses -- we lost to some great, great fighters -- but I learned that I needed to focus a little more on the individuals and the game plans and delegate different things."
He went on to clarify that his self-taught style is still a process of trial and error, even after many years spent trying to perfect it.
"I think I am just in the middle of, or was in the middle of growing pains," he said, "And I hope that we can show that we are back on track and that, in a very real sense, we just had some bad fights, some game plans that didn't go our way and we're still a bunch of great athletes and a bunch of great guys. And we hope to show that again this weekend."
The setbacks have done little to dampen the excitement Jackson exudes when speaking about his guys. He sees the losses as a way for his students and especially himself to continue to grow and expand their knowledge of the sport they love.
"It's a tough game," Jackson explained. "I take the losses real personal; I always take final responsibility for the losses so I always consider a loss my fault. In some way I was inadequate in doing something. The flipside to that is I use that to learn from, so I try to take something really positive away from that. I try to say: ‘what can I learn from this situation? What are we doing right? What are we doing wrong?' So even with a loss I feel like I improve a lot more as a trainer."
It is his always-sunny disposition that has made Jackson one of the most liked figures in the sport. His refusal to make excuses for himself or his fighters resonates with fans that have already heard every justification for defeat, and it provides him a currency that few in the sport are allotted.
"You've got to put your time in on top and kind of in the dark water, too," declared Jackson. "And I'm in the dark water and I'm just trying to learn, get a feel for it, swim out and see what we can do differently, what we can do better."
He will have his chance to wade back towards the top at UFC 73 when Evans and Marquardt attempt to stake their claims to vaunted positions within their weight classes.
In Evans, Jackson has an explosive fighter who has quickly climbed the rungs of the light heavyweight ladder since winning season two of TUF as an undersized heavyweight. Commentators are quick to tout Evans' athletic ability but rarely, if ever, give him enough credit for his work ethic or astuteness.
"Above all, Rashad always impresses me with his intelligence," Jackson beamed like a proud father. "He is a very intelligent fighter. He went really far with not a lot of information and you see him grow as he gets more and more information. He's just a brilliant guy; he's a workhorse; he's got a lot of heart; he's got a good jaw; he is just one of those special people.
"You know, there are just some fighters that just have it, and he has it."
In Ortiz, Evans face one of the most polarizing fighters in the history of the sport, and he feels he has something the former UFC light heavyweight champion just can't match.
"
Tito Ortiz (Pictures) has been the same fighter for the past six or seven years, Evans said. "He hasn't changed much at all. With a game like MMA you always, constantly have to adapt … or the game just passes you by."
As brash and charismatic as Evans is, Marquardt is mellow. The former King of Pancrase is a soft-spoken technician who is as efficient with his words as he is in the octagon. But one thing that will get him to open up is his relationship with Jackson.
"I know for a fact I would not be where I am now as a fighter if it wasn't for Greg," the middleweight said. "He has made a huge difference in my abilities as a fighter and because of him and the team, I am a new fighter. I have reached a new level because of Greg."
That is high praise coming from a man who won multiple titles in Japan before setting foot in the Albuquerque gym he now calls home, and it is mirrored in the relationships Jackson shares with all his fighters. It is a bond that bridges the gap between family and friend. It is a brotherhood that not many can understand until they go through the demanding lifestyle these people have chosen to lead.
And when
Rashad Evans (Pictures) and
Nathan Marquardt (Pictures), a pair of artists mind you, take to the octagon Saturday night, each will attempt to orchestrate another symphony originally created in the mind of the man they attribute so much of their success to.
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