The Secret to Fedor's Success: He Wins

Every sport has its singular champion, a prodigious talent who reigns supreme. And as surely as all dynasties inevitably end, every legendary champion eventually tastes defeat and is proven to be very much human.

If Fedor Emelianenko's recent one-punch knockout of Brett "The Grim" Rogers is any indication, we shouldn't hold our collective breath.

With an incredible professional record of thirty-one (31) victories, one (1) highly questionable loss and one (1) no-contest due to an accidental head-butt, the Russian heavyweight is considered the world's top heavyweight mixed martial artist and is arguably the world's top fighter in any weight class.

Fedor's style is difficult to categorize, as he rarely favors any particular style of attack. A combat sambo champion with excellent striking, wrestling and submissions, he's perhaps as well-rounded as any fighter in the world.

Fedor's preferred technique might best be described as that which ends the fight; he is just likely to end a fight with a skillfully-executed arm bar as he is to knock out his opponent with a single thunderous overhand right on the jaw. We've all seen him do it time and time again; it's never much of a surprise but nonetheless always spectacular. Consider Fedor's 36-second disposal of former UFC heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia, a much larger opponent with a sizeable reach advantage who on paper looked to be a good matchup for the Russian. Fedor stunned Sylvia connecting hard on some quick combos, sending him to the mat to cover up, where instead of continuing strikes on the ground Fedor hopped on his back and secured a windpipe choke. There can be no question about Fedor's motives, which weren't "He's hurt! Pound him out, finish him!" but rather "End the fight." (Note the lack of an exclamation mark.) The man's pulse probably never rose above 80 beats per minute.

What may distinguish Fedor Emelianenko is his understanding of the fight as a game, rather than a match against a specific fighter with specific attributes he must overcome. It's no secret that Fedor doesn't focus or otherwise modify his training camp to account for an opponents' strengths or weaknesses. His training, rather, focuses heavily physical endurance, strength, striking, balance and mental discipline under duress.

It is an approach to fighting as as problem-solving challenges rather than defeating individuals that may inform Fedor's style. It is a simple strategy; be fit, be prepared and be alert. Don't force anything; patiently exploit an opponents' first mistake and end the fight.

The manner in which he does this may vary, but almost invariably, it happens.

Steve Mazzagatti Must Be Stopped

I've always thought that referees have the toughest jobs in MMA (excluding the participants.) While judges render sometimes questionable decisions with relative anonymity, referees are forced to make split-second decisions that can make or break a fighter's career, not to mention incur the wrath of disgruntled fans.

Referees are appointed by the state's athletic commission, and as such aren't bound to a promotion or any one organization. There's a small and familiar pool of individuals who officiate the action inside the UFC's Octagon, including Herb Dean, Mario Yamasaki, Josh Rosenthal, and Steve Mazzagatti.

Mazzagatti has become the UFC's most popular referee for all the wrong reasons in the past few years. He receives his share of the usual criticisms a fan levels at an MMA referee - late or early stoppages, failure to dock points for cheating, indecisiveness, etc. - and then some. And then some. No other referee makes as many questionable calls as this guy. The short list includes:

• UFC 81: Saved by the Stand-Up
  Steve breaks Jor-El's rules and alters the course of human history, penalizing Brock Lesnar a point - with no obvious verbal warning - for punches to the back of Frank Mir's head. Mazzagatti's explanation: "Frank looked like he could use a break."*
• UFC Fight Night 14: Fingers of Fury
  Again, Steve makes a name for himself, issuing finger-poke warnings to Kevin Burns in his first bout against Anthony Johnson, and then abruptly turning around and awarding Burns the TKO victory for the very same eye pokes. Said Mazzagatti: "It wasn't even to the second knuckle."*
• Every Single Fight: Fighters Grabbing the Cage
  Stop blustering about fighters' grabbing the cage or each other's shorts, Steve. We all know you'll never dock a point or stop the action to discourage this frequent infraction. Mazzagatti's response: "I have a weakness for the fighters, whom I consider my children, and as you can see I spoil them...they won't do as they're told."*

The Ultimate Finale for Season 10 saw Mazzagatti make another giant mistake, one which may have caused a fighter to suffer needless injury. Jon "Bones" Jones was raining punishment down upon the face of Matt Hamill, and when he made the mistake of dropping illegal vertically-oriented elbow strikes, Mazzagatti waited all of three or four repetitions before stopping the action. (Note: the 3rd and 4th elbows look like they were the ones that did most of the damage.) Mazzagatti should have stopped the action after the first illegal elbow and given Jones a warning. Instead, Hamill - who apparently was finished anyway due to a dislocated shoulder, not to mention the condition known as "hamburger-face," was awarded the victory by disqualification.

Mazzagatti may enjoy this line of work, but the decisions he's made in the ring haven't inspired much confidence in the MMA community. After all, on what basis is any professional evaluated but their performance?

*Psyche

What I Learned from "The Ultimate Fighter: Season 10"

Disclaimer: it's a "reality" show. What we're being shown is probably to a large degree scripted, set up or otherwise edited into the story we finally see each episode. Chances are, there is a lot more than meets the eye. Producers make a show that needs to get ratings in order to sell advertising, period.

Clever editing from a talented production team notwithstanding, I learned the following from this season of "The Ultimate Fighter", featuring 16 competing heavyweights:

The Good

• Rashad Evans is a natural-born teacher. As talented as he is as one of the world's top light-heavies, his maturity and his ability to articulate himself make him perhaps even more well-suited to train other fighters. The proof is in the pudding; Team Evans went 7-1 in the preliminary fights and Evans' pick, Brendan Schaub, scored the upset of the year when he took out Coach Rampage's meal ticket, behemoth Marcus Jones. Very impressive work, Coach Rashad. The only time viewers saw Rashad come close to losing his cool was on the half-dozen or so occasions he and Rampage crossed paths to engage in smack-talk.
• Kimbo Slice is an earnest, humble and even charming guy trying to make a living as a fighter. He's come a long way since his days at Elite XC working as an entertainer rather than a mixed martial artist. Kimbo has come a long way emotionally, and openly acknowledges his weaknesses as readily as his strengths. As long as he continues to strengthen mentally, his lack of well-roundedness will not hold him back because (A.) the guy has killer instinct, and (B.) he has a lot of experience damaging people with his fists.
• Wes Sims was born for reality TV. It was really difficult to be bored when this guy was on screen. What kind of a person dons a Ninja costume and patiently stalks someone shooting baskets at night, just to entertain themselves? You couldn't script this kind of stuff if you wanted to.

The Bad

• Roy "Big Country" Nelson is obviously a talented fighter, coasting to the semi-final bracket with no more than the bare minimum effort necessary to secure the "W," a style which did not ingratiate him with UFC head Dana White. Roy's skillful clinic against a cocky James McSweeney finally showed us what he's capable of when forced to perform, but that may be only good enough for "The Ultimate Fighter" because in a stacked UFC heavyweight division, Nelson won't be given the chance to coast.
• Rampage Jackson, as a coach, doesn't pretend to even want to inspire the cooperation of his fighters. He wants them to win, period. When his fighters don't win - which was often - he takes his ball and goes home.
• Ostensibly a gentle giant, Marcus "The Darkness" Jones demonstrated some questionable judgement by getting in the face of Matt Mitrione over an accidental eye-poke Matt threw against teammate Scott Junk. Junk's doctor told him his fighting career was in jeopardy, which however unfortunate has nothing to do with Mitrione. Jones somehow missed the "unintentional" part of the whole eye-poke incident, which in all honesty occurred during a fight Mitrione was dominating. Note to Jones: when you're huge and dangerous, it isn't your prerogative to get angry to the point of being physical over absolutely nothing. There are places for people who behave like that, places where you get to work out a lot, wear a special outfit and have your own little room with lots of time to yourself.

The Ugly

• English kickboxer James McSweeney grew more cocky with each win, even to the point of mercilessly antagonizing troubled outsider Zak Jensen. A social misfit amongst this season's lot, the quiet and self-conscious Jensen was the target of a series of pranks by his house mates from day one. Episode 11 saw McSweeney lock the apparently claustrophobic Jensen in his own bathroom, a prank Jensen responded to by physically attacking McSweeney (albeit fruitlessly). McSweeney's bullying, rather than being entertaining, spoke volumes about his lack of maturity and it was no surprise to see him lose his next fight decisively to veteran Roy Nelson.
• Let's be honest: this season kind of sucked. Each episode's teaser followed the same pathetic "Will Kimbo fight again?" theme to build anticipation and elicit viewers, and each episode again dismissed that far-fetched notion while hastily introducing some ancillary manufactured drama, like Matt Mitrione.
• Mitrione drew criticism for his bizarre antics, which included exaggerated head injury symptoms, team subterfuge, and drinking other people's orange juice. In hindsight, most his antagonistic behaviors were probably the work of a very skilled mind-game practitioner (Mitrione was a pro defensive tackle). That aside, Mitrione is in the right place; to quote Dana White: "The kid can PUNCH!" He's one of the more naturally athletic fighters from season 10, and throws hurtin' bombs from a long reach. His disappointing quarter-final loss to James McSweeney was probably due to a combination of inexperience and panic. As Rashad Evans pointed out, Mitrione hit the mat with his hand ready to tap, before McSweeney even had the choke properly secured. There are a lot of fighters Mitrione could beat, but he has to stop beating himself first.