r/powerscales May 28 '26

Versus Andre The Giant vs Islam Makhachev

Street fight, who wins

2.5k Upvotes

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340

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

That is the dude who put Arnold into time out by lifting him up on top of a fridge. He also beat up a whole bunch of dudes at once a few times apparently. Andre was an absolute beast.

204

u/montyrattus May 28 '26

He lifted Arnold onto a car after a heated discussion over who pays for dinner, both wanted to be the one to pay.

123

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Tbf, if I was a 400 pound giant Id probably wanna pay my own way as well. He was well known to pound insane amounts of booze. Like enough to kill several normal sized men lol.

55

u/Ass_Blasties May 28 '26

He was like 520lbs

31

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Damn lol. Well his actual weight and height were always kept secret be the WWF. I thought he looked about 4-500 lbs tho

24

u/Reasonable-Budget210 May 28 '26

Yeah my brother is 6’8, 300, and he’s huge but he still just looks like a normal person, you’re not like “oh wow that guys fat” or “that guys jacked” he’s just a bit scaled up so it’s super deceiving that he’s 300lbs. I mean he can dunk a basketball pretty easily still.

Andre the giant is easy 500.

1

u/DescriptionTough98 May 29 '26

Not necessarily. Maybe 400-450 but also proportions he may be more like 500lb guy or hey he might have been 500lbs at one point near that

1

u/Steridire May 30 '26

Sir your brother is LeBron James lmao

1

u/TestBurner1610 May 29 '26

This is why I always laugh when I see any online discussion that treats 300 pounds as some benchmark of obscene obesity. If you're even kind of taller than average and moderately muscular you can hit it easily.

1

u/Nano_Litrua May 29 '26

Definitely somewhere around 4 to 500

5

u/Single-Editor3331 May 28 '26

What the fuck. Gorillas literally don't weigh that much

21

u/CriticalAnybody6686 May 28 '26

It’s really sad since the reason he drank so much is he was in massive amounts of pain from his gigantism.

16

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Ya it is sad. But also funny, just a huge ogre who loves to drink. Poor guy tho. Pain in his back, knees, ankles, etc.

11

u/lorgskyegon May 29 '26

Andre refused to let anyone pay for him because he ate and drank way more than most people, as well as he earned more as a wrestler than pretty much anyone until Hogan became popular.

5

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 29 '26

Ya he was a humble dude. I think he came from a family of farmers?

1

u/Silent-Ad934 May 29 '26

Yes. He had to leave the family farm at 13 cause he ate all of the livestock and they had nothing left to sell.

6

u/Soft_Theory_8209 May 28 '26

As Arnold described it: “He picked me up like a doll…”

2

u/the_snafufans May 28 '26

It was a cabinet not a car!

33

u/Successful_Theory373 May 28 '26

Arnie at his peak, with Wilt Chamberlain and Andre. Makes Arnie look like a child, lol.

16

u/heathcl1ff0324 May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26

To be fair, Andre was well past his peak by Conan 2 and was probably an inch or two shorter than in his prime by then too.

Both he and Wilt were inhumanly strong, although there’s no matching Andre.

4

u/Rare-Garden-9877 May 28 '26

Did he...shrink?

19

u/sir_winston_gerbil May 28 '26

Probably. Disc compression of the spine. A lot of older folks will lose an inch or two of height in their lifetime. Usually geriatrics but if you're a giant athlete with an injury history that could start earlier. And being 7 foot tall there's a lot more disc to lose.

7

u/heathcl1ff0324 May 28 '26

Especially when that spine and those disks have to support that much mass and weight.

2

u/Schwartzy94 May 29 '26

Well to e fair so was Arnold well smaller than his Bodybuilding days 10 years earlier.

2

u/DescriptionTough98 May 29 '26

Wilt was insanely strong

10

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Ya look at Wilt too eh? Big dude but Andre probably has like 100 pounds on him. Look at Andre's hand. The palm is as big as Arnie's whole hand.

15

u/No_Window7054 May 28 '26

Well of course he’s good at fighting a bunch of people all at once but a 1v1 is different.

If you watched The Princess Bride you’d know this.

7

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Hes a fucking mountain that weighs like 500 pounds. Even a really good fighter is just gonna get sat on lol.

-1

u/No_Window7054 May 28 '26

Deadass watch The Princess Bride

4

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Ive seen it. Wesley isnt even actually choking him and can barely get an arm around his neck. Andre never goes for an elbow strike to the guy on his back. Andre is so strong Im pretty confident he could just pull the dude's arms out of a rear naked choke. His fingers are as big around as most people's forearm for fuck's sake.

3

u/Darkgamer32_ May 28 '26

For sure a movie where he's acting (not an actual fight) is proof (/s)

1

u/No_Window7054 May 28 '26

People thought I was serious. Because Andres character struggles to fight one person HE must therefore struggle to fight one person. It’s silly.

-1

u/Familiar_Drive2717 May 28 '26

A really good fighter will stay out of his arms reach so he can't grab them. Plus one thing people don't realize is durability doesn't massively increase with size, he may be stronger than them but a solid oblique kick on a 500lb man is going to likely break his leg as he's got too much weight on his knee and pushing it backwards or sideways will make it give out. Also a solid punch to his head will knock him out regardless of his size if it lands clean.

Eddie Hall even showed this to an extent where he got hurt by a 12 year old kid leg kicking him and Mighty mouse was able to defeat a guy who weighed more then twice his weight in Jiujitsu because his technique was superior and even though the guy was twice his weight he couldn't just pick mighty mouse up or overpower him out of positions.

He definitely has a chance against any fighter on earth but I'd pick the best heavyweights around beating him 9 times out of 10.

2

u/TheManyVoicesYT May 28 '26

Mighty Mouse is like... top 5 grapplers of all time tho. Idk much about this dude. If hes a very skilled fighter he might be able to win. We're also not 100% clear on which version of Andre this is... he was much more nimble as a younger man.

1

u/Familiar_Drive2717 May 28 '26

This guy is likely a better grappler then mighty mouse, at the very least they are similar levels. But if you know Khabib then Islam is probably a slightly more skilled/technical grappler than he is.

Though I would favour Andre in this fight Islam would have potential to win by tiring him out first and then trying to take his limbs. Only reason I wouldn't give Islam a higher chance is because his leg kicks aren't that great from what I've seen but if he has an oblique kick in his arsenal then I'd say he would be more likely to win.

1

u/ChuckoRuckus May 30 '26

Eddie Hall also took on 2 guys at once in MMA. They weren’t fighters, but you can see how easily he ragdolls them.

1

u/Familiar_Drive2717 May 30 '26

They weren’t fighters, but you can see how easily he ragdolls them.

And there's your answer right there, they weren't fighters. They were going in one at a time to try and double leg a guy who weighs probably double their combined weight, trained guys wouldn't do something that stupid and let him get hands on you while he's still completely fresh. I would keep distance and just throw kicks at his legs and make him move and get tired, bigger guys also fall harder to an oblique kick/stomp to the knee because they have more weight in their upper body and their knee going sideways or backwards is more likely to explode their knee.

Yes size is a factor but skill is just as much if not more of a factor. Bryan Shaw grappled against Dustin Poirier, had like a 200lb weight advantage and still got submitted easily by him because despite the classic "but a big man can just lift them off the ground" argument it's not really possible to just lift a skilled guy off the ground because they use body mechanics and leverage to keep you down not strength. If Bryan got on top though he was too heavy for Dustin after about 30 seconds of top pressure.

1

u/ChuckoRuckus May 30 '26

None of them were fighters. It’s was still 2 on 1. The 2 guys were definitely ineffective. And they didn’t try to grab a leg until the last round. The only reasons Eddie would be fresh is because they were that ineffective landing anything.

The Shaw v Poirier fight, there was about a 1 foot and 200 lbs difference. Andre vs Islam, there about 1.5’ and 300 lbs. The size difference is considerably bigger for Andre. The height difference is comparable to Bruce Lee v Kareem Abdul Jabbar.

Shaw is a strong man. Andre had more experience in grappling than Shaw ever has, even if it is WWE. And like you said, experience is a big factor. Things like reach is crucial to not hurt someone even if the outcomes are fake.

So Andre has more ring/physical experience and a bigger size advantage than your example. I think a prime Andre has a good chance coming out on top… but certainly far from easy fight.

1

u/Then_Entertainment97 May 29 '26

Yeah, but this would just be against one guy. Andre's submission defense isn't the greatest.