Between Lesnar and Fedor, I’d still give it to Fedor. I was reading about Machida’s much-touted elusiveness the other day, and his stats prove out that he’s the second least hit fighter in MMA. The least hit fighter ahead of him? Fedor, to the tune of something like less than one hit a minute. I’m not sure how much of that’s due to his elusiveness and how much is due to his tendency to end fights in the first round, but either way he’s a beast. Lesnar’s improving, but he was getting tired and frustrated moving his man-mountain self around in the Couture fight. If Randy had slipped an inch to the right I think we might have seen a different fight. And I think we might see a much different fight with Fedor.
Don’t get me wrong, I would not be terribly surprised if Fedor beat Lesnar. I’m sure he will be the betting favorite.
But are you really comparing Lesnar with Choi and Zulozinho? Really? Lesnar is an amazing athlete, a D1 wrestling champion, with good jiu-jitsu. Zulozinho and Choi are oddities that have made a career by cashing in on the Japanese fondness for freak show match ups. For god’s sake, Choi’s last opponent was Jose Canseco!
I don’t buy that Mir thought Lesnar would not take him down. Mir may be cocky, but he is not an idiot. The fact is, Lesnar displayed some impressive (albeit attribute driven) jiu-jitsu and completely stymied Mir’s guard work.
As far as previous match ups with wrestlers have gone, I will admit that Fedor didn’t seem too bothered by having Coleman on top of him – but then, Fedor doesn’t seem to ever be bothered by…anything! In any case, the only two heavyweight wrestlers that Fedor has faced have managed to take him down a number of times – one of which (Kevin Randleman) was notable in that it appeared quite possible that Fedor would be killed upon impact!
This will be the first time Fedor has faced a top notch wrestler who is also skilled in jiu-jitsu (at least in the areas he needs to be). And the wrestler happens to be enormous and hit like a truck. I could see Fedor catching Lesnar with a quick series of punches, much like he caught Tim Sylvia, but if Lesnar takes him down, I think he will take the fight.
A. Silva is 3rd, and that’s after factoring in 40 minutes of not getting touched by Cote or Leites :eek:.
He said so himself.