More than the sum of its parts

Expectations can be a powerful force in any athletic competition. As I wrote in my blog about Roger Huerta, expectations can put a lot of pressure on a fighter and not meeting those expectations can be personally and professionally devastating. On the other side, a fighter that can come in with hype and rise to the occasion can put their career on the fast track early.

As a commentator I have learned not to put too much stock in someones accomplishments outside of MMA. A lot of fighters come in with tremendous accomplishments in related combat sports like wrestling, BJJ, or muay thai. These accolades are extremely important, not only in marketing a fighter, but in analyzing their potential strategy in the cage. Whats important to remember is that for every athlete who translates their success outside the cage into a successful MMA career (Ben Askren, BJ Penn, Mirko Cro-Cop) there is one who falls flat. Some come in with an avalanche of hype, others seem to crash without ever even appearing on the radar.

We all remember the Penns and Askrens, here are some of the others who fell through the cracks(separated by sport, cause I like to make it easy on you):

Outstanding wrestlers

Cary Kolat:

Kolat was my all-time favorite wrestler to watch. He was an undefeated, 4-time Pennsylvania HS state champion and was named Outstanding Wrestler all 4 years, no one else had ever won it more than once. At Penn State he placed 2nd and 3rd in the NCAA tournament his Freshman and Sophomore years. After transferring to Lock Haven he won 2 national titles, finishing his college career with a 111-7 record. He was an Olympian in 2000 and won 3 world cup gold medals (1998-2000). The guy was an amazing wrestler to watch, he was aggressive, fast, and technical.

His MMA career was extremely short. He had 1 fight in 2005 and was submitted in the 2nd round by Enoch "The Animal" Wilson. As far as wrestling goes its hard to beat Kolat's credentials, but considering the fact that he only had one fight, its likely he decided that he didn't want to make the commitment to MMA that he had made to wrestling.

Royce Alger:

Anyone remember his fight with Enson Inoue? Mark Coleman was so amped during the walk-out that it looked like he was accompanying the Rolling Stones. The fight didn't work out so well for Royce as he tapped to an armbar in less than 2 minutes.

When it came to his wrestling career this guy was the real deal. He wrestled under the legend Dan Gable and was a 2-time national champ for the Hawkeyes. After college he won 2 World Cup gold medals and 2 Pan-Am titles. Royce was known for his ferocity on the mat, he was versatile, aggressive, and executed Gable's "grind your opponent till he gives up" strategy perfectly. Unfortunately the work ethic he put into his wrestling training didn't exactly transfer into his MMA training. His cardio looked TERRIBLE in his KO loss to Eugene Jackson in his 2nd UFC fight and after getting floored in the 2nd round, Alger left the cage for good with a 3-2 record.

Kenny Monday:

As far as I know, and I know wrestling pretty damn well, Monday and Kevin Jackson are the only Olympic wrestling gold medalists to ever compete in MMA. As the only multiple Olympic wrestling medalist to ever enter the cage, Monday has to be considered the most decorated wrestler to ever cross-over.

He was a 4-time Oklahoma state champion and finished his HS career with an incredible 140-0-1 record. At Oklahoma State he was an NCAA Div-1 national champion. After college he was a gold-medalist at the 1988 Olympic games, a world champion in '89, and a silver medalist in Barcelona in '92.

Monday showed some serious potential in his debut against John Lewis in 1997. He displayed tremendous power, great takedowns (of course), and a naturally fierce ground and pound. Despite all of his tools, Monday only fought once. In 1997 it wasnt exactly easy to pay the bills doing MMA. With the hype that Olympian Ben Askren had going into MMA, one can only imagine what would have happened if someone with Monday's skills and credentials would have made his debut today.

Jiu-Jitsu Champions (does anyone else hate the term "Jiu-Jitsu player"?)

Saulo Ribeiro:

Few people have stayed relevant in the sport as long as Saulo Ribeiro. He received his black belt from Royler Gracie at the famous Gracie Humaita academy in 1995 (the same academy I trained in on Fight Quest). After receiving his black belt, Ribeiro went on to become one of the most decorated BJJ fighters of all time, winning 5 world championships (1997-2000, 2002, tied for 3rd all time). Unlike some BJJ standouts, Saulo has an outstanding no-gi game, wining 2 ADCC championships in 2000 and 2003.

While his BJJ career has been marked by its consistency, his MMA career was anything but. He only competed 3 times over the span of 6 years. His most famous fight was a 22 second blowout loss to Yuki Kondo in 2000. After submitting Jason Ireland in 2002, Saulo focused on his BJJ and coaching career with an MMA record of 2-1.

Marcelo Garcia:

Anyone who has seen Marcelo Garcia roll knows he has the best no-gi game of all time. His style is aggressive, fluid, and MAN does he know how to finish. He has won 2 ADCC championships and one 2nd place. On his way to those medals he submitted a stunning 21 out of 28 opponents in both the 76kg and absolute divisions and at the PSL event in LA he submitted Jake Shields (the first time Shields had ever been submitted in a BJJ competition). Its not like his gi-game sucks, he is a 4-time world champion and has been the dominant force in the division since 2003. The guys doesn't just win against the best, he makes it look easy. He demolished outstanding grapplers like "Shaolin" Ribeiro, Kron Gracie,"Xande" Ribeiro, and Shinya Aoki with an unmatched combination of skill and speed.

In his sole MMA fight, Garcia discovered the difficulty of sinking in the near-naked with MMA gloves on. Despite being attached to Dae Won Kim's back for almost the entire first round, Garcia was unable to sink the choke that had doomed so many of his opponents in BJJ. After Kim made it to the 2nd round he managed to expose Garcia's GROSSLY under-developed standup and ended the fight by opening up a nasty cut just 20 seconds into the round.

Fernando "Terere" Augusto:

Might as well follow up Marcello Garcia with the last man to beat him in the BJJ World Championships at his weight class. Terere didn't just beat Garcia in the finals of the Mundials in 2003, he SCHOOLED him. He countered Garcia's vaunted sweeps, passed his guard, and tapped him with a triangle. As far as traditional BJJ goes, Terere is the best I have ever seen with my own eyes. His match with Jacare in the open division at the Pan-Ams in 2004 was awesome, was an honor just to be there.

He earned world championships at every belt level, one a year from 1997 to 2000, defeating BJ Penn in the brown belt semi-finals in 1999. In 2004 actually competed at heavyweight, losing to Fabricio Verdum in the finals ON POINTS. There is simply nothing the guy cant do when it comes to classic BJJ. His style is as creative as it is technical.

What Terere never really displayed was that outstanding no-gi game that is essential to a successful MMA transition. It's not that his game was bad, its that he was FAR more accomplished in BJJ than in submission grappling. His only MMA fight was a split decision loss to Gleison Tibau in 2000. Given his questionable behavior over the past few years, I think we'll be lucky to see him again as a force in BJJ, let alone MMA.

Strikers

Malaipet:

In Thailand, this guy is a household name. He was a Rajadamnern Stadium champion and is legendary for his kicks and clinch game. He started training at age 8 and has an amazing 137-27-5 record in Muay Thai. I had the pleasure of training alongside Malaipet at North Hollywood Muay Thai and believe me when I say that the guy is LEGIT. Pros came in there and he smilingly took them to school. I was ringside when he defeated the Dutch national champion in Almera, Holland. Few people can take or give or take punishment like Malaipet.

His 3-3 MMA record is the result of his questionable cross-training. No one in their right mind would ever trade with Malaipet, but he simply never put the effort into the ground elements of his game. As his former BJJ coach Shawn Williams told me "the guy is lazy". The days when a guy could walk into the cage with one skill and be successful are long gone, a lesson Malaipet has painfully learned.

Mark Hunt:

This is one guy who was certainly on the radar. He was the K-1 World Grand Prix champion in 2001 and compiled a pro record of 43-13-2 He was a standout on the K-1 scene and was known for his stalking, gutsy style and his iron head (the kick Mirko laid on his head in their 2002 fight would have killed a rhino, yet Hunt got up and kept fighting). He had serious KO power and always won the crowd over with his willingness to stand in front of his opponent and trade.

In MMA he started out well, winning 5 of his first 6 fights, including wins over Wanderlei Silva and a PRIME Mirko Cro-Cop. His last 6 fights have been a different story, he has lost all of them, including a brutal 18 second KO at the hands of Melvin Manhoef. The bad combination, in my opinion, was the "Pride Effect" of guys getting thrown into the deep end of the pool in their first fights and Hunts inabililty to keep his ground skills in the same league as his standup skills. Also, his plodding style makes him child's play to take down, and in a division submission specialists like Fedor and Josh Barnett thats a recipe for disaster.

Ramon Dekkers:

Have to include this one. As far as kickboxing legends go, he is one of the best. This guy competed in Muay Thai before it was really an international sport. He played by their rules, in their country and, against all odds, he won. He started training in Muay Thai at 16 in Holland and was a Dutch national champion by 18. He was an 8-time Muay Thai world champion and was the first forigner to be named "Muay Thai Fighter of the Year". This guy was ferocious, technical, and hit like a guy twice his size. Dekkers actually beat Duane Ludwig in a K-1 show with only one arm (he had torn a ligament in his shoulder) and knocked him down in every round. With a record of 186-30-2, Dekkers is considered by many to be the greatest Dutch kickboxer of all time. With company like Rob Kaman, Remy Bonjasky, and Ernesto Hoost, thats an amazing compliment.

Dekkers just made the transition to MMA too late. By the time he faced Genki Sudo in K-1 in 2005 he was already 35 and supposedly retired. Add in the fact that he had no ground training and only had a few days notice, he really didn't have a prayer. A one-dimensional kickboxer taking on an experienced MMA submission specialist only really makes sense in Japan (ok, ok, Toney-Couture aside) and Dekkers was quickly submitted in the 1st round. I guess a guy with 218 Muay Thai fights has earned a quick pay-day fight once his competitive days are over.

I know the examples I have listed are something of a mixed bag and that each fighter had their own reasons for not making a significant impact in MMA. It just helps to keep in mind that not every athlete with a solid background in fighting sports will live up to the hype in the cage. MMA has transitioned from "style-vs-style" to a unique sport of its own, the athletes who recognize that and train accordingly will always have an advantage...

The signs at the end of the road...

Roger Huerta didn't stick around very long after his loss to Eddie Alvarez. As I walked into the cage to interview Eddie, he was already on his way out. He was, understandably, devastated. He had just been dominated for two one-sided rounds and had been stopped for the first time in his career. He was physically beaten up and was distraught as well. He had gambled heavily on this fight and had lost everything. As I passed him at the cage door I saw a look on his face that I recalled seeing once before on a defeated fighter.

I was ringside doing the international feed for the first Affliction fight when Fedor demolished Tim Sylvia in the first round of their highly anticipated heavyweight showdown. The look on the face of Tim Sylvia after that fight was the same one I saw on the face of a defeated Roger Huerta. It wasn't the fact that he was blown out of the water, or that it had been a heavily hyped fight, it was the fact that he discovered where he ranked, how far he could rise in the annals of MMA, and it was not to #1.

While it can be extremely painful in the end, it is the ultimate goal of every fighter to answer 2 questions throughout the course of their career: how far can I go in this sport? and, for the ones who get to the top, how long can I stay there? The reason it's painful is that the vast majority of fighters aspire to be a champion, but only a handful actually will. As a result, there is an inevitable, painful realization for them that they wont ever get to the ultimate goal, and that realization is usually the result of a fairly one-sided beating. At the end of the Affliction fight Tim Sylvia realized that when the book of MMA history is written, he will be remembered as a championship heavyweight who, even at the height of his career, was always 2nd to the legendary Fedor. He understood his final resting place in the MMA hierarchy, and that is never an easy thing to face.

Roger Huerta is an extremely popular and entertaining fighter. He is personable, good-looking, and is one of the most recognizable figures in the sport, but he is not, and will most likely never be, an elite lightweight. He had his chances to be sure, he took on 3 of the best in the division: Kenny Florian, Gray Maynard, and Eddie Alvarez, and each time he fell short. Only the Gray Maynard fight was comparatively close, and the only beating he took was at the hands of Alvarez. He had come close, but elite status eluded him.

The problem is that most fighters can make an entire career out of being pretty good. The UFC is full of middling gatekeepers that will never crack the top-ten, even one who fell to Roger Huerta, Clay Guida, is still drawing a paycheck. Huerta is exciting and marketable, so what's the big deal if he cant beat the best? The promotional difficulty of Roger Huerta is that he received a LOT of hype at the beginning of his career. With hype comes scrutiny, many people who follow the sport knew that he had been fed a diet of GBNDs (game but not dangerous), guys that would bang with Roger and make an entertaining fight, but who didnt have the skill set to kill the golden goose. His potential was something of a negative, he had attracted too much attention to gate-keep (a-la Clay Guida or Kurt Pellegrino) and was in the divisional equivalent of a shark tank. The bubble could only hold for so long. Clay Guida can go on fighting for years without a title shot because no one EXPECTS very much from him, a LOT was expected of Roger Huerta.

Lets face it, the guy was managed REALLY well. The whole game plan was to build him up and keep him away from the upper levels of the sport. A good manager, Monte Cox in this case, knows what kind of fighter he has. Its his job to make sure that he faces the right fighter at the right time. Monte knew that Roger couldnt beat the best, so he kept him away from that level for as long as he could, but Roger wanted Kenny Florian and left Monte to pursue the fight. Five fights and four losses later, Roger finds himself in a tough spot. Due to his popularity he is used to commanding top dollar, so its going to be hard for him to find promoters willing to pay what he is used to getting. Japan is a tough market as well, as his exposure here will be of little value overseas.

After his fight I had one of his fans tweet me and say that he can still turn it around, as he is only 27. The first problem is that a 27 year-old isnt exactly a spring chicken in the fight world. True, you can last a lot longer in MMA than you can in boxing, but more than a few fighters have seen their best days by 25. Also, the psychological effects of this loss may be a bit too much to overcome. That look at the end of the fight said it all to me, Huerta saw the chasm between himself, and the best of in the sport. It will take a serious re-evaluation and re-dedication to change his training around and get over that gap.

I like Roger and as a fan I hope he goes for it...