My character doesn't have a bunch of black belts. Just in his past he had taken up some different style of forms of martial arts, through his teen years he studied kung fu, then after his teens his life turned sour when he got betrayed, he had taken up a few other forms of arts like some boxing, kickboxing here and there and tried some other kung fu style for a short time and all had failed.
As he got older he became homeless, then he was found by some martial art teacher/master/or coach who had helped him get back on his feet and get his life together and welcomed him to the dojo or gym. This is where I'm trying to decide whether it should be karate or MMA. The teacher/master that welcomes him in would of had some various backgrounds in martial arts himself, this teacher had studied in his past life growing up disciplines like karate, kung fu, judo, Japanese jiu-jitsu, eskrima.
Now this teacher could have become an MMA trainer or decided to become proficient in teaching karate. Or I could just say MMA since MMA would probably gain more readers attention but I would want to keep some philosophical atmosphere to it. If the teacher is an MMA trainer, couldn't he still incorporate some of his old teaching principles like his old school karate and jiu-jitsu training he received 30 or 40 years ago?
So maybe I should just go with MMA but this teacher happens to have some traditional value he adds to it like some philosophy. Does this work?
And another thing, why is Karate Kid, Cobra Kai so popular, yet it is about traditional karate martial arts? Yet the fights do look exciting, I wonder if this series actually bases their karate tournaments on an actual karate tournament system? It almost looks like a mix of kumite sports karate and kyokushen karate type of tournament?