Ken Shamrock mends fences with adoptive brother Frank Shamrock for MMA project

UFC Hall of Famer and former champion Ken Shamrock said he’s ended his longtime feud with adoptive brother Frank Shamrock to work on a hush-hush MMA project he believes will “challenge a lot of the top promotions.”

“I think this is something that the MMA fans have been waiting for and that they deserve,” Shamrock recently told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “They shouldn’t have to choose. They should love both and be able to share in both.”

Shamrock (28-15-2) said the two discussed their contentious past and mended fences while filming the project earlier this month.

“We sat down, and we had some discussions, from childhood to the fight, to the argument, to the separation, to the not going to my dad’s funeral (and) the reasons why,” he said. “We hashed it out right there on video, and there’s a lot of stuff in that that’s emotional.”

The adoptive brothers fought their last respective bouts in 2010, but they’ve remained at each other’s throats for more than a decade. They grew up as adoptive brothers in the group home of Bob Shamrock and laid the foundation for one of MMA’s first super camps, Lion’s Den. Ken Shamrock was one of the UFC’s biggest stars while Frank Shamrock won the UFC middleweight title.

They split, however, after a fiery confrontation about their respective careers, during which Frank said Ken threw a computer monitor at his head. Ken continued on with the Lion’s Den, and Frank formed his own team. Several times the feuding Shamrocks were linked to a potential fight as they bashed each other in the media.

Ken Shamrock said that despite his enmity, he never wavered in his belief that Frank Shamrock deserved recognition for his accomplishments – namely, a spot beside him in the UFC Hall of Fame.

“My brother Frank is an icon in MMA,” he said. “I trained him. I got him where he needed to be, but he has a place, and I have a place. And the sad thing is two brothers in MMA … who helped make MMA what it is, and then to have the Shamrocks, who are the other brothers in this, to really have the rivalry with the Gracies, not to be able to share this glory with the people who helped build it.”

A rivalry with UFC President Dana White continues to keep the younger Shamrock off the honor roll, though he has found a place in the sport as a commentator and, most recently, a coach on Spike TV’s “Bellator MMA: Fight Master.”

Not long ago, Ken Shamrock might have taken a swipe at his brother’s new gig. But he said those days are over.

“Now it feels like when I go in to an interview, I’m not afraid they’re going to ask (about the rivalry),” he said. “It’s gone. There’s nothing now that I don’t feel for my brother. I’ve always said, even when we were angry at each other, that my brother should be in the UFC Hall of Fame right there with Mark Coleman and Dan Severn. It’s good to be able to stand on his side and not wonder whether he’s going to stand with me.”

Although it’s not yet clear what the brothers are standing together to achieve, the elder Shamrock, who’s also at work on a reality show about his security business, hopes that the reconciliation serves as an inspiration in MMA and beyond.

“We’re going to make a statement … on how people can just put things aside and say, ‘I’m going to go into this thing with this being my fault,’” he said. “I want to find out what I did to make things happen the way they happened. ‘How did I do this?’ Instead of ‘Why did you do this,’ or ‘It’s your fault.’ I’ll tell you what, it’s a roller coaster.”

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