Marco Ruas and his importance to MMA

Marco Ruas and his importance to MMA
by Eduardo Graça

To most of the american audiences Marco Ruas' winning the UFC 7 is his career's highest accomplishment, specially for the dominant fashion he displayed in the event.
His performance in the 1995 tournament edition highlighted the top of cardio capacity and variety of dimensions ever displayed by a one-night-tournament fighter.
Marco Ruas first torn Larry Cureton apart with leg and body kicks, punch combinations and violent clinch game to finish the fight via heel hook at 9:23 minutes of fight.
He then engaged the judo black belt goliath Ramco Pardoeu, who early in the fight caught Ruas' back in a clinch through which both would remain attached for a good slice of their 12:27 minutes bout. The much bigger and heavier Pardoeu couldn't put Ruas down and suffered an intense and unusual feet-stomping torture which would culminate in a wrestling workshop by Ruas.Once the brazilian bare-knucle veteran full mounted his enourmous exhausted opponent, the fight was over by a freakish desperate tapout.
Ruas moved on to fight the hulking kickboxer Paul Valerans, and the two striking specialists went on to a 13:17 stand up war highlighted by the elusiveness of a nasty leg kicker Ruas that would finish the fight after Valeran's collapsing to his knees with a straight-hook KO combo.
Long before Marco Ruas stepped in the UFC octagon, the visionary fighter played a dramatic role in the legendary Luta Livre-Jiu Jitsu Rio de Janeiro's rivalry famed by Rickson Gracie's beach-beating-to-coma of luta livre champion Hugo Duarte and as well as by the event-descrution during a Eugene Tadeu vs. Renzo Gracie fight.
During the 80's the Luta Livre instructor and Vale-tudo champion Marco Ruas understood the need of learning jiu-jitsu to be a complete fighter. While as a JJ blue belt, both the Gracie team and nemesis hugo duarte's LL academy wanted Ruas to compete under their flags. It's no surpise Ruas would come up with his own fighting system: Ruas Vale-tudo,responsible for early ufc's stars Pedro Rizzo, Babalu Sobral amongst other notable fighters.
Marco Ruas's a black belt in judo, jiu-jitsu, luta livre e tae kwond do as well as a muay thai, boxing and vale-tudo champion. His first recorded-to-broadcast fight dates 1984 when he was introduced as the urban legend "the king of the streets".
He's been respectfully and personally defied at his own gym by Rickson Gracie himself.
Marco Ruas may not have the Mithological status of Rickson Gracie's perfect 400 fight record but it's clear that, in a time when it took a black belt in any single martial art to get a shot at Vale-Tudo, this man understood that the most effective fighter can be found in a blue belt in two or three different disciplines.
Marco Ruas was a MMA fighter before MMA existed as a sport.