The Rumble December 20, 2009 Fightin’ & football mix Glazer training players the MMA way Jay Glazer, the NFL Insider for “Fox NFL Sunday,” isn’t content with being the Randy Couture of NFL scoopage. Glazer, a onetime Post columnist, is on his way to revolutionizing the way professional teams and players train in the offseason. Glazer and his partner, legendary mixed martial artist Couture, started a UFC-style of workout training program called MMAthletics last June. Since then, they have made believers — and cold-blooded gladiators — out of NFL stars Jared Allen, Patrick Willis, Matt Leinart, among others (the Jets’ Calvin Pace trained with Glazer and his crew during the first week of his four-game suspension this year). Players fly into Las Vegas and train with Glazer and Couture’s pro fight team out of his Xtreme Couture facility, but Glazer also is set to open a training facility in Burbank in the next few months. Nevertheless, the duo wanted to reach all athletes and not limit it to those who can spend time in Vegas or California. The partners are now expanding nationwide. They soon will be meeting with NFL team executives to design a game plan where their MMA coaches/fighters will be “outsourced” to interested teams, a plan Glazer hopes also will educate more fans on his beloved mixed martial arts. Asked to describe the level of NFL interest, Glazer told The Rumble: “Astounding. I’ve had guys like Drew Brees, Tony Romo, Justin Tuck, Troy Polamalu, a ton of guys who want to push themselves in their training. Every training camp I went to, teams talked to me about it. I would say almost every coach said to me, ‘I wish we could get Player X, Y & Z in there for an attitude adjustment.’ ” The indefatigable Glazer takes great pride in how Allen was transformed from an ordinary pass rusher (seven sacks in 2006 before turning to MMA) to a slimmed-out menace (151⁄2 sacks the season after he trained with Glazer’s guys, including 421⁄2 sacks and counting over the past three seasons). Allen was subsequently rewarded with a then-record-breaking six-year, $74.5 million contract. Allen, who shed 25 pounds of “bad weight” that offseason, swears he is in the best shape of his life. “My core strength and cardio went through the roof,” Allen says in Men’s Fitness. “I don’t even run anymore. All I do is fight training. It made football easy.” The Jets would like to have Glazer and his men toughen up passive underachiever Vernon Gholston. “That’s the kind of guy I want!” Glazer said. “The Glaze,” who had a couple of fights in 2003-04, completely immersed himself in training when he hooked on with the rising team Arizona Combat Sports in Tempe five years ago. The former Post NFL Insider is featured in the December/January issue of Men’s Fitness. He trains these days in Los Angeles with UFC Hall of Famer Chuck (The Iceman) Liddell, judo phenom Karo Parysian and others. “For me it’s my escape,” Glazer says. “These guys become your brothers, except when my phone rings when we are in the cage. That ticks them off, but they are used to my scoopage calls by now. My phone goes everywhere!” But be forewarned — once Glazer gets his hooks in you, there is no escape. Leinart walked in a Hollywood pretty boy — checking your ego at the door is a requirement — and left as something else. “He’s a totally different human being,” Glazer says. The regimens are catered to the position and sport a player plays. “Patrick Willis came to us at 238. He did eight workouts a week, and he left at 238. But his belt size dropped one or two sizes. In three weeks. We completely opened up his hips and range of motion.” What would Glazer say to prospective NFL clients? “First of all, you’ve gotta want to be great. Don’t be afraid to be great,” he says. “You’ve gotta be willing to push yourself past the limits of anything you ever knew you could. We are gonna find what you think your breaking point is, and we’re gonna blow past it. We’ll change your life. We’ll change your mentality to, ‘If you hit me once, I’m gonna hit you five times.’ That’s the fighter’s mentality.” Glazer’s team also currently is working with professional lacrosse players and is hoping eventually to branch out to major league baseball and hockey. Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/sports/more_...#ixzz0eIah5OJg Hopefully they get to Kerry Rhodes too. Fuck Teddy Atlas. Couture, bitch! I want to do these workouts too. It sounds badass...hopefully they get some MLBers in there.
This is interesting. It might save Ghost from being cut this year. Maybe. All indications I've gotten from articles is that the Jets are keeping him, but they are saying the same about Lito. It'd be sweet if this worked out, I just highly doubt it.
What this can do for Gholston is the one thing I keep harping on him needing: growing some self-confidence. With the right confidence level, coupled with natural physical ability, Ghoslton can be a very good player. This will be interesting to follow.
It'd open up his hips too, making him a more fluid athlete. The guy could use some confidence though... must suck to be a 24 year old physical freak only to have everyone and their mother think/know you're really a vag.
That's what we need. We need to get him pissed off enough where by the final year of his contract, he finally explodes for 20 sacks, and then we lose him in free agency (or give him a big contract and watch him suck).
They won't cut him, organization would be stupid to after only 2 seasons, regardless I hope the first thing they do is literally put this guy in the ring and have him fight someone and see how much of a vag is really is ... He just needs a nice ass kicking to jump start his career =) Regardless if LT, Rex Ryan, Randy Couture and Jay Glazer can't make a man outta Gholston then no one can
I wonder who will be next in the parade of mentors tasked with turning Vernon Gholston into a football player. Tony Robbins?
Best case scenario... Gholston becomes a football player. Worst case scenario... Gholston gets beaten up for 8 weeks. Either way I'm happy PS If we could book in Rhodes too...
If they can turn Gholston into a beast, and IF they throw in a complimentary ShamWow, I say sign him up.
