Remember when wanderlei silva and other chute boxe practitioners came to UFC after pride and they didn't do as good as they used to? A key component of their method was not allowed, the stomp/penalty kick, which also appears to be a thing in karate, at least in theory https://youtu.be/ZsIhbtmEe1Y?t=21 One could also argue that anti dope controls were more rigorous in UFC, which is certainly true, and at the same time when there's a tolerance for doping and everybody does it, it's not really an argument Unlike MMA, karate wasn't originally "designed" to be a ritualistic form of combat, for duel The spirit of karate is closer to "1 vs many one shot one kill" than "1 vs 1 sport", you maim, cripple, and kill with karate, you poke eyes, break larynx, kick the genitals, etc it's the idea, you have medieval weapons also within karate It's not intended for ritual combat/sport