Top Heavyweight Fighters

May 28, 2008 by Evil E

Here are 6 of the top Heavyweight MMA fighters in the world.

My last MMA article on Kimbo Slice generated a lot of interest, so here is my follow up piece on some other Heavyweight fighters to watch out for.

Coincidentally, all 6 of these guys are scheduled to appear on the July 19th “Affliction Banned” fight card.

From the man with the belts clockwise, Fedor Emelianenko (27-1), Aleksander Emelianenko (13-3), Ben Rothwell (29-5), Josh Barnett (22-5), Andrei Arlovski (12-5), and Tim Sylvia (24-4) have beaten some of the best Mixed Martial Arts big men in the business.

So while Kimbo Slice is an intriguing specimen with a ton of potential, he’ll have to beat one of these guys before he really proves himself. Because even if he knocks out James Thompson in 12 seconds on Saturday, I won’t be that impressed. Here’s why…

Aleksander Emelianenko

:11 second KO over James Thompson (Kimbo Slice’s opponent)

Some say that James “Colossus” Thompson has a weak chin. Others say that he’s all brawn and no brains. Both are correct. As you can see, Thompson isn’t the most skilled heavyweight out there. So if Kimbo knocks the dude out in 12 seconds, please don’t jump to any conclusions.

Aleksander’s older brother is the one who usually gets mentioned as the greatest fighter in the world, but “kid” brother is no joke. At 6-6, 253 pounds, Aleksander is 6 inches taller and 20 pounds heavier than Fedor. His work ethic is questionable, but he’s only 26 years old and (in my opinion) a better boxer than his bro. He thinks he’s Muhammad Ali at times and has fast, heavy hands. If you want to see a standup WAR! (with a devastatingly funny finish), check out this fight:

vs. fellow Russian Sergei Kharitonov (EPIC Battle)

Aleksander also has some crazy tats. The guy was sentenced to 5 years in prison for robbery (released after 3 1/2 years), and he got some scary, symbolic tattoos along the way. If you ask me, the Grim Reaper holding a baby spread across your entire back is pretty gnarly. But maybe that’s just me…

Josh Barnett

2002 UFC fight vs. Randy Couture (2nd Round)

Barnett became the youngest UFC Heavyweight champion ever (24 years old) thanks to this fight. Later that year, he allegedly tested positive for steroids (Barnett vigorously disputed), his title was stripped, and he left the UFC for Japan.

Fight #1 vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (Current Interim UFC Champ)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6245918388267521251
Josh Barnett pics

While in Japan, he joined the New Japan Pro Wrestling organization, won the Pancrase Grand Prix title, and became a PRIDE Fighting star. He did lose 3 times to Mirko CroCop, but he beat several top fighters (Aleksander Emelianenko, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Mark Hunt) and won most of the Japanese fans over with his solid combination of skill, passion, and showmanship (all with a steroid-free, beefcake body). On July 19th, Barnett gets a chance at revenge against the hard-hitting Pedro Rizzo (Rizzo beat Barnett in 2001).

Fedor Emelianenko

Who is Fedor Emelianenko? (An Absolute Machine)

Fedor Emelianenko

Fedor is a man who can shrug off a Randleman suplex like it’s nothing. Fedor is a man who enjoys breaking cinder blocks and eating ice cream. Fedor is the 2nd Most Badass fighter I’ve ever seen (after Bruce Lee of course). Fedor is not a man… he’s an absolute machine.

Fedor Highlight video (Don’t miss this one!)

I wasn’t officially a fan of Mixed Martial Arts until I saw Fedor fight CroCop in 2005. Never before had I seen such power, speed, grace and skill from a Heavyweight fighter. The crazy thing about the elder Emelianenko is that he’s actually pretty small for a Heavyweight (6-0, 233 pounds). He is like a calm, respectful teddy bear who cannot be defeated (his lone loss was due to a freak accidental cut). After he destroys Tim Sylvia (is there any doubt?), many MMA fans are crossing their fingers for a bout with Randy Couture. Kimbo Slice is a LONG ways away from Fedor right now.

vs. Hong-Man Choi (7-2, 352 pounds)

Tim Sylvia, Andrei Arlovski, and Ben Rothwell

I’m sure you’re all familiar with Tim Sylvia. Standing 6-8, 260 pounds, the former UFC Champ has a longer reach than almost every fighter out there. He’s also rather boring and someone that most fans love to hate. I don’t like the guy, but I give him props for accepting a fight with Fedor. I would love to see Kimbo test his skills against this behemoth somewhere down the road (late 2009?).

Andrei Arlovski became the interim UFC champ in 2005 after he submitted Sylvia. Tim revenged the loss by beating AA twice in 2006, but Arlovski bounced back with 2 recent wins over legit opponents (Fabricio Werdum & Jake O’Brien). Now he is free from his UFC contract, and rumor has it that he will be fighting for Affliction in July. His rumored opponent? Ben Rothwell.

I haven’t seen a lot of Ben Rothwell fights, but he’s a very big dude (6-5, 265) from the Miletich camp (Matt Hughes, Tim Sylvia, Jens Pulver, etc.) riding an impressive 12-fight winning streak. He has solid finishing skills (17 KO’s and 10 submissions in his 29 wins), but he has yet to beat any A-level heavyweights (he lost to Sylvia in 2001). I’m eager to see how he’ll fare against Arlovski.

July 19th, 2008 - Affliction Banned

One thing’s for certain: Affliction (the clothing company that so many fighters love to rep) has formed an extremely solid fight card for July that’s loaded with Heavyweight talent. At first report, Affliction’s debut was supposed to take place at the American Airlines Center in Dallas (Mark Cuban’s arena) and air the undercard live on HDNet (Mark Cuban’s HD cable network). Unfortunately, the proposed deal for the venue and broadcasting rights fell through. I was excited to see Cuban involved in such a high-profile debut, but I’m sure he’ll make a big splash on the MMA scene soon enough.

Instead, the inaugural event will take place at the Honda Center in Anaheim (formerly the Arrowhead Pond). The undercard will air live on Fox Sports Net and the rest of the fights will be shown on Pay-Per-View in the USA & Canada ($39.95 suggested price). Here is the tentative fight card:

Bouts Scheduled to Air on Pay-Per-View:

-Fedor Emelianenko vs. Tim Sylvia
-Ben Rothwell vs. Andrei Arlovski (rumored)
-Josh Barnett vs. Pedro Rizzo
-Matt Lindland vs. Fabio Negao
-Renato Sobral vs. Mike Whitehead

Bouts Scheduled to Air on Fox Sports Net:

-Aleksander Emelianenko vs. Paul Buentello
-Savant Young vs. Mark Hominick
-Antonio Rogerio Nogueira vs. TBA

Other Bouts:
-Justin Levens vs. Ray Lazama
-Mike Pyle vs. Brett Cooper
-J.J. Ambrose vs. Patrick Speight

In Conclusion…

I’m going to watch the Kimbo Slice fight on CBS just like everyone else, but I’m going to make sure that I don’t overreact when he wins. Simply put, James Thompson is not a fighter whom you can accurately assess his skills against, so we must take a Kimbo knockout with a grain of salt. After the fight, I will try to picture the 6 guys mentioned above in place of Thompson. Is Kimbo ready to face a Top 10 Heavyweight?

Then I will be highly anticipating the Affliction Banned event. The UFC is really lacking in Heavyweight talent right now (the only upcoming bout worth mentioning is Fabricio Werdum vs. Brandon Vera, and Vera is more of a light heavy), so we must look to other organizations to see some serious Heavyweight clashes. It looks like Affliction is going to deliver in July, so keep your eyes on these 6 guys.

CONFIRMED: Fedor is not human Fedor Emelianenko just cemented his status as the most badass...
Kimbo Slice - Next TV Star? CBS is going to broadcast MMA live on Saturday nights...

Written by Evil E · Filed Under SEE NO EVIL, TV - Video

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Comments

CommentsTop+Heavyweight+Fighters2008-05-29+06%3A51%3A34Evil+E to “Top Heavyweight Fighters”

Andrew King on May 30th, 2008 1:36 pm

Holy shit! They’ve really built that card up since the last time I looked (a couple weeks ago). Now Little Nog is on there, too?

Andrei has long been my favorite fighter, so I’m excited to see him fight Ben Rothwell. I haven’t seen too much of Rothwell, I’ll admit, as the IFL has never managed to make me a regular viewer. But I look forward to it. I love those kinds of fights: where the striker pick-pick-picks his opponents apart, and then when the grappler shoots in for his precious little takedowns, it’s like, NO!! BLAM, BITCH! EAT KNUCKLE SANDWICH!!! BYAAAHHH!!! You wouldn’t believe how much bitching there was about Machida this weekend (we actually had to merge two dozen threads into a “Official Machida Sub-Forum”. I thought that was a ridiculously entertaining fight. But now it appears fans won’t even be patient enough for a STANDING technical bout…it’s never enough if someone doesn’t leave in the ambulance.
Andrew King on May 30th, 2008 1:53 pm

Oh, some more random thoughts:

1) For those who don’t know: Little Nog won bronze earlier this year at the Pan American games in his weight class in boxing. Watch out for those hands.

2) Big Nog once said in a (Brazilian) interview that Fedor is easily the quickest heavyweight he’s ever fought. You’re not joking, Evil, when you talk about how fast these guys are at their size. It’s intimidating, too, since speed is really the one quality of the body you can’t improve too much. Flexibility, strength, aerobic and anaerobic conditioning…these can all be improved immensely. But speed? To give an example: they once did muscle biopsies of all the different kinds of olympic athletes: the marathon runners had successfully converted their type II fibers to an average 23% slow-twitch, 77% fast twitch. The sprinters? 65% fast-twitch, 35% slow-twitch. Untrained subjects? 55% fast-twitch, 45% slow-twitch.

In other words, speed like this is born, not made. I’ve simply never been as impressed with a heavyweight’s speed (even Arlovski’s) as I was with Aleksandr’s in his fight against Ricardo Morais- particularly the punch he jumps in with to stun Morais: :
Andrew King on May 30th, 2008 1:54 pm

It looks like Evil has the site set up to refuse embeds, so here’s the URL for that A.Emelianenko-Morais fight:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w90b_vcaHB8
Evil E on May 30th, 2008 6:19 pm

Yeah, that Morais fight is a good one, altho the dude was basically standing upright the whole time. Aleksander is no joke on the feet.

I can’t believe people are bitching about Machida! He dominated Tito in every way possible save for knocking him out, and he came close to doing THAT w/ those killer knees. Sure, he didn’t take many chances, but he fought a flawless fight. How can people hate on that?

I enjoy his style, but I would like to see him go against an elite striker (Iceman???).
Andrew King on May 31st, 2008 3:14 pm

Iceman’s an intriguing matchup for three reasons:
1) I just looked at Machida’s fight record again, and he’s never fought a truly unorthodox high-caliber striker like himself.
2) As Wandy just destroyed Jardine, we now know that Chuck’s win over Wandy stands for more than just legacy- both are still in the game.
3) It’s the only legitimate way to get Iceman back to #1 contender status. He fills the seats.

Also, interesting aside: I followed that wiki link to read about Aleksandr’s tattoos. I don’t know if you just put these on to survive in a Russian prison, but he very well might be a total douche racist: one tattoo says, “God is with us” in German- a tattoo popular with Nazi officers; and the second are the stars on his knees with a swastika in the center of one.

I found it really strange, too. I watched “Eastern Promises” earlier this year, and learned about the Vors. To become a Vor, you get two stars on your knees just like his tattoos. And that’s one of only two tattoos he won’t discuss (the other, a cobweb, is imagery usually used in Russian prisons to indicate drug addiction).

Is Aleks a Vor? Yeah, yeah, for some reason I don’t realize, that’s a stupid question.

I also found it funny; it said on the Wiki site about that the Vors that it was originally a thieves guild that was later absorbed into the Russian Mafia. But dealing arms and trafficking drugs are considered forms of commerce by them (against the thieves code) and is against their code to become involved in. But in the Eastern Promises movie, they were arms dealers. I just wish they had at least explained/acknowledged this discrepancy.
Andrew King on May 31st, 2008 3:17 pm

Oh, and in the midst of all this free CBS Kimbo excitement starting in a couple of hours; don’t forget, everyone, that Faber and Pulver fight on the WEC card tomorrow.
Evil E on July 17th, 2008 5:40 pm

So is anyone gonna watch the Affliction card on Saturday?

They’ve done a horrible job of marketing it (probably cuz they’ve spent so much as it is) plus the UFC is showing some free fights on the same night including Anderson Silva, but I’m pretty sure if you’ve only seen the UFC before, guys like Fedor, Aleksander, and Barnett are REALLY going to impress you.
John Levitt on July 24th, 2008 9:22 am

Didn’t watch it cause I get a lot of MMA between Versus, HD net, showtime, etc. The non-heavy weight that most impresses me is Uriah Faber. That kid is a complete stud and a NoCal guy if I am not mistaken. Love to watch that guy in the cage.
Evil E on July 24th, 2008 9:53 am

Yeah, Faber is from Sacramento. His last fight was in Arco Arena and from what I hear, the place was slammin. He dominated Jens Pulver, but his inability to finish him was rather disappointing.

I miss HD Net!! Mark Cuban puts up some excellent HD programming, but I don’t get that channel anymore. I don’t get Showtime either. I think Nick Diaz is fighting in his hometown this weekend on Showtime.

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Top Heavyweight Fighters

Aleksander Emelianenko

:11 second KO over James Thompson (Kimbo Slice’s opponent)

vs. fellow Russian Sergei Kharitonov (EPIC Battle)

Josh Barnett

2002 UFC fight vs. Randy Couture (2nd Round)

Fight #1 vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (Current Interim UFC Champ)

Fedor Emelianenko

Who is Fedor Emelianenko? (An Absolute Machine)