By Tyler Mason, sportsnet.ca
There is a saying in Latin, cui prodest, which translates to “Who stands to gain?” Always keep this in mind when forming an opinion on combat sports.
They are sports run by promoters where all combatants can never face each other. Outside of tournaments, fights are chosen by a matchmaker and sold by a promoter. I won’t get into boxing for obvious reasons, but let’s take a look at mixed martial arts. There is a reason tournaments were so important in the infancy of MMA. Remember that phrase while I take you through the career of Fedor Emelianenko.
A lot of new fans only heard of Emelianenko after discovering the UFC, and from Dana White trashing the once king of the heavyweight division. Inevitably a lot of opinions ranged from “Fedor sucks” to “He never fought the best.”
Neither is true. Emelianenko fought the best and he beat them. Was he as good at the end of his career as he was in his prime? You would probably be wrong to think so, but to say he sucked or never fought the best is just plain stupid. Take a look at Emelianenko’s career.
He began in a promotion called Fighting Network RINGS or “RINGS” for short. There he compiled a 3-0 record before entering a tournament in 2000 dubbed RINGS King of Kings Tournament 2000 (go figure). RINGS was not the UFC, so it was an inferior promotion, right?
Well if you said that you’d partially be right. RINGS was not the UFC. At the time, it was better (at least in regards to the heavyweight division). Who was the reigning UFC heavyweight champion at the time? Randy Couture, who just so happened to be in the same tournament (Couture would lose to Valentijn Overeem in the semi-finals). There were also a few others in the tournament you may know: Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Alexandre (Cacareco) Ferreira, Dave Menne, Renato (Babalu) Sobral, Roberto Traven, Gilbert Yvel and Jeremy Horn. The winner of the tournament the year before was Dan Henderson.
Emelianenko’s first opponent was Arona, an undefeated fighter (2-0) whom he beat by decision. Who is Arona? He is a Brazilian jiu-jitsu fighter who went undefeated (13-0) in Abu Dhabi Combat Club. In ADCC he won the under 99-kg weight class in 2000 and 2001. On top of that he also won the openweight class (no weight limit) in 2001 and beat Mark Kerr in a super-fight in 2003.
Who cares? Nobody good competes in ADCC, right? Some of the men Arona beat were Kerr, Sobral, Tito Ortiz, Jeff Monson, Jon Olav Einemo, Ricardo Almeida, Saulo Ribeiro, and Jean Jacques Machado.
Tsuyoshi Kohsaka eliminated Emelianenko from the tournament due to a cut caused from an illegal elbow (he would later beat Kohsaka in 2005). Had he not been cut, Emelianenko would have faced Couture.
In the years that followed Emelianenko would claim two RINGS openweight tournaments.
After that, he would beat Semmy Schilt. Schilt was at the time an Openweight King of Pancrase, whose previous five fights had been in UFC or Pride (he has since gone on to become a six-time K-1 Champion).
Next up, Heath Herring, whom Emelianenko brutalized for 10 minutes before the doctor stopped the fight. What had Herring done? Well he had just beat Kerr and Igor Vovchanchyn.
After all that, you’d think Emelianenko would be in line for a title shot. The Pride heavyweight champion Antonio Rogerio Nogueira had previously won the King of Kings 2000 tournament, was the runner-up in 1999, and had beaten Mark Coleman (first ever UFC heavyweight champion) for the title.
As an aside, understanding Mark Coleman’s career is pivotal in understanding the heavyweight championship lineage. Coleman was the first UFC champion after he beat Dan Severn for the UFC Superfight Championship. Coleman then lost in spectacular fashion to Maurice Smith, who in turn lost to Randy Couture. Couture would lose his next fight to Enson Inuoe. Inuoe would enter a tournament called the Pride Grand Prix 2000.
This tournament was probably the most important piece in understanding the heavyweight division. Some of the entrants were Royce Gracie, Kazushi Sakuraba, Guy Mezger, Vovchanchyn, Kazuyuki Fujita, Mark Kerr, Gary Goodridge, and Mark Coleman. After Coleman won he was unquestionably the Heavyweight Champion of the World.
Emelianenko fought and beat Nogueira at Pride 25 in 2003 and became the new Pride heavyweight champion. Emelianenko would win his next four fights before entering the Pride 2004 Heavyweight Grand Prix. He would win his way through Coleman, Kevin Randleman and Naoya Ogawa on his way to the finals. His final opponent was Nogueira again.
This time Nogueira was the interim Pride heavyweight champion having beaten Mirko (Cro Cop) Filipovic. Unfortunately, the fight would end in a no contest due to a clash of heads. However, they would fight again at the end of the year where Emelianenko once again won. On December 31st 2004 there is no question that Fedor Emelianenko was best heavyweight in the world.
From there Emelianenko would go undefeated in his next 10 fights beating the likes of Filipovic, Hunt, Matt Lindland, and former UFC champions Coleman (also a former Pride champ), Tim Sylvia, and Andre Arlovski.
Emelianenko destroyed Sylvia in the first round of their fight. (Sylvia had just lost the UFC interim title to Nogueira.) He knocked out Arlovski also in the first round. At the time Arlovski was the consensus No. 2 ranked heavyweight in the world.
“The one who doesn’t fall, doesn’t stand up.”
— Fedor Emelianenko post-fight after losing to Fabricio Werdum on June 26, 2010, his first loss in almost a decade
When he lost to Fabricio Werdum something changed. A couple weeks later the biggest draw in MMA, Brock Lesnar, beat Shane Carwin to unify the UFC heavyweight championship and the promotional machine that White took over.
Who stands to gain from diminishing Fedor Emelianenko? First and foremost the UFC is a promotion, run by a promoter. A promoter’s job is to sell tickets and he will tell you anything to do so. White says a lot of things I agree with, he does more for MMA than most promoters would, and he actually cares about the sport, but when he said “Fedor sucks,” he was wrong.
“Eventually, Fedor’s going to be here. I want Fedor. I want him to come to the UFC and everything else.”
— Dana White at the UFC 100 post-fight press conference on July 11, 2009
To his credit White and the UFC tried to bring Emelianenko into the promotion, but it didn’t happen. That’s when fans, unaware of Emelianenko’s career, jumped on board and popular opinion changed.
“I took the final decision. This was my last battle. I am out of the sport for my family, for my children. From now on I want more time to devote to my daughters.”
— Fedor Emelianenko at post-fight press conference after beating Pedro Rizzo on June 21, 2012
Fans need to remember Emelianenko for what he accomplished, not what fans, promoters and media said or will say about him.
If you believe that “to be the man, you have to beat the man” then Emeliannenko really was the Last Emperor until he lost. And if you believe in lineage, then the matchup of Junior dos Santos and Alistair Overeem carries more meaning to the heavyweight division than your run-of-the-mill title fight.
To end, here’s what other fighters thought about Emelianenko:
“I think Fedor is the best in the world. The reason being, he’s so well rounded.”
— Frank Mir on MMA Live July 2008
“Fedor Emelianenko.”
— Georges St-Pierre on Inside MMA in 2008 when asked who is the best fighter in MMA.
“I’m one of the best in the world and I was amazed at how good Fedor is … I don’t think he’s human.”
— Tim Sylvia post-fight press conference after his loss to Emelianenko in July 2008
“He could go from 0-60 without blinking an eye.”
— Frank Trigg
“He has beaten every single style and every single opponent. He is the answer to the question, who’s the best.”
— Frank Shamrock
“The best fighter to ever climb in any arena is Emelianenko, Fedor. There’s nobody better. He is the best fighter I’ve ever seen, fought, trained with, everything.”
— Kevin Randleman
“If they mean bad by having skills, then he is the baddest man on the planet. That’s the guy who can beat pretty much everyone there is.”
— Bas Rutten
“Fedor is amazing.”
— Mark Coleman
“He is absolutely in the same category as the Wayne Gretzkys, the Michael Jordans, the John Elways.”
— MMA referee Big John McCarthy
“He’s the best. He’s my favourite.”
— BJ Penn
