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Don Frye is a professional wrestler and a professional mixed martial arts fighter.

Biography

Frye began wrestling as a freshman in 1984 for Arizona State, where he was trained by fellow future Ultimate Fighting Championship legend, then assistant wrestling coach, Dan Severn. In 1987, he won the freestyle and Greco-Roman events during an Olympic qualifier. A year later, he transferred to Oklahoma State, where he encountered another future UFC star amongst his teams mates; Randy Couture. In 1995, Frye helped train his old friend Dan Severn for the Ultimate Ultimate, accompanying Severn's entourage to Denver. Severn returned the favour in 1996, when he acted as Frye's manager for UFC 8; 'The Predator' went on to win the tournament with relative ease. However, the controversial nature of the event meant that Frye was barred from both firefighting, his previous occupation in Bisbee, Arizona, and from training in the Buena High School gym he had used since his ASU days. He is considered one of the original "cross trained" MMA competitors who have a background in multiple disciplines. Along with his collegiate wrestling experience, Frye holds a 2nd degree black belt in Judo and a professional boxing record.

Frye has beaten notable MMA competitors including Ken Shamrock, David "Tank" Abbott and Gary Goodridge. Frye was once one of the most dominant figures in MMA, but has lately focused on other endeavors. He primarily wrestles for New Japan Professional Wrestling, but occasionally takes part in MMA bouts (or even K1-style kickboxing matches).

Frye's most recent appearance was in the 50th Anniversary Godzilla film Final Wars (2004). "Gojira: Fainaru uôzu". Frye plays the role of Captain Douglas Gordon. In an interview, Frye mentions that unlike his fights where he has complete control, acting in a Godzilla film he had no control but enjoyed the experience nonetheless. The director of "Godzilla Final Wars," Ryuhei Kitamura, mentioned that he wrote the Gordon role with Frye in mind since he was a fan of Frye's fighting matches. Kitamura found Frye's tough-guy/good-heart demeanor to be the perfect role for the comic book character of Gordon. Most of his dialogue in the movie was in English. It was found quite interesting due to the fact that it seemed the Gordon character can understand Japanese, yet cannot speak it very well.

Record

See also

Footnotes

1. 'Injuries KO OU Wrestler', The Sunday Oklahoman, Mac Bentley, 23 October 1988

2. 'Three Cowboys Win Titles At St. Louis Mat Tourney', The Sunday Oklahoman, 20 November 1988

3. 'Fighter doesn't understand the furor', The Providence Journal-Bulletin, Mike Szostak, 12 June 1996

American mixed martial artists

ドン・フライ

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Don Frye".

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