Prior to about 2012, it’s doubtful many people expected Fabricio Werdum to wind up here.
Just a couple months shy of his 39th birthday, Werdum sits atop the heavyweight mountain. As he prepares to make the first defense of his 265-pound crown against Stipe Miocic on Saturday at UFC 198, it all still feels like a crazy dream.
What if Werdum is the fighter the heavyweight division has been waiting for all this time?
What if he’s the one to finally bust the star-crossed UFC belt out of its perennial slump?
What if it was always him, always here, right under our very noses?
In terms of unexpected MMA storylines, that would be right up there with the best of them.
By now the ballad of Werdum is well-known to most hardcore fans. As recently as 2008, he departed the Octagon in fairly ignoble fashion, on the heels of a knockout loss to the then-unheralded Junior Dos Santos at UFC 90.
At the time, it seemed like it would be the last we’d see of the talented Brazilian jiu-jitsu stylist—at least on the sport’s biggest stage.
But then Werdum landed in Strikeforce and fired off a respectable 3-1 mark, including becoming the first man in nearly a decade to defeat the great Fedor Emelianenko.
He lost his last fight in the promotion—a stinker against Alistair Overeem in the doomed Strikeforce heavyweight grand prix—but the run was good enough to get him back in the UFC when the bigger company absorbed the smaller one in early 2011.
Since then, there has been no stopping him.
Werdum has gone 6-0 in his second UFC run, amassing four stoppages while showing the sort of well-rounded skill set rarely seen among big men.
He defeated up-and-comer Travis Browne in April 2014, beat Mark Hunt seven months later for the interim title and then unified the belt by shocking Cain Velasquez with a second-round submission in their long-awaited fight at UFC 188.
We now have no choice but to regard Werdum as the No. 1 heavyweight in the world—even if it feels a bit by default. His rebound over the last half-dozen fights has been remarkable.
To what do we owe this late-career turnaround? Well, MMAJunkie’s Ben Fowlkes recently wrote it might have been that terrible fight against Overeem that finally set Werdum on the right path.
Seems the current champ learned a few things from his dismal performance that night, both about his training and about how he fights:
For one thing, [Werdum] said, he was in less than optimal health for the [Overeem] fight. It was originally slated for April, and then got pushed back to June, which resulted in an uncommonly long training camp for Werdum, who said he entered the fight banged up and, for the first time in his career, “overtrained,” which left him feeling exhausted before the fight even began.
“I lost, but it was a horrible fight. It was horrible for both of us…,” Werdum told Fowlkes. “I am better with time; this is true. But I’m also more prepared now, and this is very important.”
Due to revamped training methods and a commitment to supplementing his vaunted grappling attack with an evolving striking base, Werdum is tougher than ever for the opposition to get a read on.
Check these diverse methods of victory in a trio of recent fights: He armbarred renowned submission ace Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, knocked out feared knockout artist Hunt and then became the first man to submit suffocating wrestler Velasquez.
You couldn’t blame the opposition if it left them scratching their heads about just how to try to beat Werdum.
It also puts him in decent position to be the man who finally brings some semblance of stability—not to mention respectability—to the UFC heavyweight belt.
The 265-pound title has long been MMA’s most cursed championship. No one has ever defended the thing more than twice without losing it, and bad things have a tendency to happen to the man who carries it.
Bas Rutten had to retire due to mounting injuries pretty much immediately after winning the heavyweight title back in 1999. Randy Couture ended at least one of his reigns with a protracted contract dispute. Frank Mir got hit by a freakin’ truck. Brock Lesnar was stricken by diverticulitis.
And then there’s Velasquez. After largely being hailed as the division’s savior, he’s just never been able to stay healthy. Prior to the Werdum fight, Velasquez spent all of 2014 on the disabled list. Injuries had waylaid his career even before that. Now, we’re left wondering if he’ll ever be able to make good on his potential.
To say that Werdum inherited an uncertain legacy when he won the title would probably go down as a significant understatement. The truth is, however, the heavyweight title picture is about as certain right now as it has ever been—and at first glance it shapes up well for him.
Werdum is going off as a slight favorite over Miocic this weekend, according to Odds Shark. If he wins, a third fight against Overeem is likely in the offing sometime later this year.
He defeated the Dutch kickboxer in Pride back in 2006 before falling to him in their Strikeforce clunker. A trilogy fight would seem to come at a good time for Werdum. Overeem is 35 years old now, and despite his win over Andrei Arlovski last week, he’s widely considered to be on the downside of things.
Overeem has mostly underwhelmed since coming to the UFC—he’s sort of the anti-Werdum in that regard. Especially since testing positive for elevated levels of testosterone prior to a scratched title shot in 2012, he’s looked worlds away from the hulk who went 11 fights without a loss from 2007-2011.
If the two met up during 2016, Werdum might well be the fashionable pick to win.
After that, he would likely be looking at a rematch against the winner of Velasquez vs. Brown scheduled for UFC 200, both of whom he’s already defeated.
It’s a lot to forecast, especially in the heavyweight division, where looking ahead has always been a fool’s errand.
But if he continues to fight as well as he has so far during his second UFC stint, you have to like Werdum’s chances of putting together the most successful heavyweight title run to date.
And that wouldn’t be too bad an accomplishment for a guy who seemed like his best days were behind him some eight years ago.
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