wow! ...a Bruce fan too, Bruce would have been a great trader since he studied human behavior in great details, don't you know he majored in Philosophy.
I include him in one of the trading quotes :- Ultimate Of The Ultimate Fighter Bruce Lee Pound for pound, I think Bruce Lee had the leanest muscle. With his enthusiasm, energy and attitude, I think it is very hard to beat him. Also, he has got plenty of charisma. He is my hero.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=N_H7IAIKQ1g&mode=related&search= http://youtube.com/watch?v=rpkSqtDtZS4&mode=related&search=
Get real. People take and survive kicks from 250 K1 fighters who kick many, many times harder than Bruce Lee.
On this I agree and the kick that is shown on the video that Drawdown posted Bruce used for displays and seldom during sparring. He called it the burning foot sidekick. If you will look closely the footwork was taken from fencing. It was a great way to close the gap very fast. But Bruce preferred to keep his feet on the ground and as far as I know never kicked anybody during an actual fight. Even with the new K1 and UFC the rules would have kept Bruce from performing the techniques that he spent the most time practicing which is the eyestrike and knee kick. But to say that he could not stand up with todays fighters is total speculation. My opinion his that he could.
I'm not fond of the additional rules & restrictions on UFC after they've gone mainstream. It favors the close-quarters wrestlers more, which is kinda boring to me personally. Few people remember Bruce's streetfighting in Hong Kong before his movie days. He also did boxing tournaments. He won the Golden Gloves in Hong Kong after defeating the reigning champion, after only a couple weeks of training. Bruce's kick would've been your first encounter and you wouldn't be able to get close enough to grapple. He'd kick your hands and break them when you tried to punch. Then he'd take out your temple and head next. All out of reach from a boxing stance... From the kicking abilities shown on UFC, I doubt they'd stand a chance. Now what I'd really like to see on UFC is a sumo-wrestler... he'd just have to fall on you and that'd be game over...
anybody trading, lol, anyway leg has longer reach than hand and it can strike with much stronger force, only problem is to over come gravity force when quickly switch to standing on one feet, Bruce Lee seem to do that quite easily some fancy foot work http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZQN872guAW0&mode=related&search=
Yes Bruce did box and from what Danny Inosanto and Glover have told me he was very skilled. Skilled enough that Ali went to work with Bruce several times. But in the Jun Fan boxing or what is now JKD the only real kicks Bruce did were for harrassment to the shin and instep. Quote from Bruce: "It makes as much sense to kick to the head as it does to punch to the toe" He kept his feet on the ground when fighting but thougth that the only true way to defend against a kick was to master the kick. Also note that their is a BIG difference between JKD and theatrical JKD. The true art is very straight forward attacks trying to tie up the hands and at the same time attacking. Jesse Glover taught me a few things based on the very early teachings of Bruce and I trained privately for 3 years under a man anmed Joseph Cowels another Seattle student of Bruce. Both men had the most fierce attacks I have seen and Mr Cowels was 55 when I met him.
It's unfortunate that a lot of people's impression of Bruce was of the "celluloid" fighter because he became so big in making movies later in life. He had already been such a martial-arts master so long before the films that a lot of people forgot about his fighting abilities. He actually had to slow down his movements so that you could catch it on film. Videos of his tournament and training is much tougher to find. Some little clips of those here, like the famous 1-inch punch that completely knocked people over: http://www.metacafe.com/watch/92068/bruce_lee_catch_his_speed_if_u_can