You love Aikido.

[Patrick]

Ok.
I've got a friend who is not an MMA fan, but everytime I say something about MMA he goes off on a tangent about how "I saw this 90 year old Aikido master throwing around all these young black belts and if any of these MMA guys would just learn Aikido he'd be unstoppable and blahblahblah".
You get the idea.
I always call bullshit but he's quite steadfast in his assertion which is mostly under-educated, wide-eyed speculation.

But then the debate always ends up being about the relevance and actual power of Aikido.
He basically argues that if you are an Aikido master then you are an unstoppable force, able to deflect any attack from anyone, anywhere, anytime....even if you were born in the late 1800's.

I argue that, really, Aikido looks like a lot of bullshit to me. I've seen some of these demonstrations they do with the old man taking on the young upstarts, and it all looks rather staged. Yeah, they're attacking him, but it seems awfully choreographed if you ask me. Listen, I know Aikido isn't an art with no legitimacy at all. I know there are aspects of it that could be used in real world situations.

My question to anyone who may have more knowledge of this art than I do is just....really?
Is this shit really possible? I mean, I guess "anything is possible" but....really?
Could a quasi-healthy 90-something who walks with a cane really humiliate a group of rampaging, able-bodied, bastards using only the slightest touch and ever so subtle movements with the grace of a ballerina? Or am I completely justified in my skeptisism?


*Edit
Also, of course, do you think Aikido could possibly have any practical use at all in MMA?