The Pan-American games has long been a proven ground for future MMA stars. Over the last 20 years a wealth of wrestlers have featured at the Pan-Ams before making a successful switch to the cage. Pan-Am champions who have gone on to successful MMA careers have included Daniel Cormier, Ben Askren, Sara McMann and Joe Warren and that is truly the tip of the iceberg. Given the success of recent Pan-American stars in MMA, it comes as no surprise that MMA fans hold a vested interest in the successes of Team USA and after this weekends successes, it’s safe to say we may well have witnessed some future MMA stars.
This past weekend proved to be quite an impressive one for Team USA who managed to win an amazing 15 medals, including 8 golds with all-time great Jordan Burroughs once again taking center stage. Burroughs, a University of Nebraska graduate, continued his international reign of dominance by winning gold in the 74kg division. Burroughs’ win extended his international record to 108-2 and made him a firm favorite to defend his Olympic title in 2016.
Burroughs spoke about his time at the Pan Ams with TeamUSA.org:
“Gold never gets old,(U.S. Coach) Bruce Burnett talked to me before the match and said the guy would stay down, stay low, back up and give you a hard time early. I knew that would happen but I just stayed had to stay the course.The focus was on continuing to move and continuing to work, and get angles and then obviously I thought he would break a little bit at the end.”
Elsewhere, top freestyle American talents Kyle Snyder, Brent Metcalf, Zach Rey, Adeline Gray and Whitney Condor won gold. Full results from the games can be viewed here.