What does the future hold for Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic?Many Ultimate Fighting Championship fans are wondering what’s left for the popular Croatian fighter after his recent third-round KO loss to Brendan Schaub at UFC 128 back in Marc…
What does the future hold for Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic?
Many Ultimate Fighting Championship fans are wondering what’s left for the popular Croatian fighter after his recent third-round KO loss to Brendan Schaub at UFC 128 back in March.
The former PRIDE Fighting Championships standout has now lost back-to-back fights with back-to-back KO’s. In the days following the loss to Schaub, UFC President Dana White openly stated that he thought the loss signaled the end of Cro Cop’s fighting career.
However, White has recently confirmed that Mirko Cro Cop will fight at least one more time.
Courtesy of MMA Fighting, White revealed that Cro Cop would fight again and had this to say in regards to Cro Cop’s future: “Do I think he should have retired? Yeah. But I don’t think he’s in one of these situations like Chuck Liddell, who needed to retire right then. He’s a man, a grown man, and if he wants to continue to fight, that’s his right. And he still has a fight with me.”
Mirko Filipovic is best known as the winner of PRIDE’s 2006 Open-Weight Grand Prix, beating Wanderlei Silva and Josh Barnett on the same day and finishing both opponents.
In total, Cro Cop fought over twenty times in PRIDE and was one of its biggest stars.
Since debuting in the UFC at UFC 67 in 2007, Mirko Cro Cop has compiled a record of 6-5 with one No Contest. Inside the UFC, Cro Cop’s record stands at 4-5.
All four of those wins were stoppages, although four of his five losses were also stoppages.
Cro Cop’s recent two-fight losing-streak is only the second time in his career that he’s lost back-to-back fights, and the first time he has ever lost by back-to-back KO.
The main Pay-Per-View card of UFC 130 is loaded with potential: from Brian Stann vs. Jorge Santiago to Frank Mir vs. Roy Nelson, from Quinton Jackson vs. Matt Hamill to Thiago Alves vs. Rick Story, UFC 130 looks to have something for everybody. But in …
The main Pay-Per-View card of UFC 130 is loaded with potential: from Brian Stann vs. Jorge Santiago to Frank Mir vs. Roy Nelson, from Quinton Jackson vs. Matt Hamill to Thiago Alves vs. Rick Story, UFC 130 looks to have something for everybody. But in a move that was only done once before (for UFC 129), the UFC will give fans access to every single preliminary fight of UFC 130.
That’s an additional five free fights, with three fights on Facebook and two on Spike TV. It’s like getting a second event for free, and even better, the UFC preliminaries have gone from good to great in a matter of months.No longer are these fights “just the prelims”, they’re exciting encounters featuring some increasingly big names.
At their best, the “Prelims LIVE” broadcasts give us an early look at some of the UFC’s biggest potential stars. Heading into UFC 130, these are the three fighters scheduled to compete in the prelims that you absolutely should not miss.
We’re now only a few days away from UFC 130, featuring a main event between former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Quinton Jackson and perennial contender Matt Hamill. The bout was originally a lead-in to the third and likely final fight between Frank E…
We’re now only a few days away from UFC 130, featuring a main event between former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Quinton Jackson and perennial contender Matt Hamill. The bout was originally a lead-in to the third and likely final fight between Frank Edgar and Gray Maynard, but was bumped up to main event status when both Maynard and Edgar pulled out due to injury.
Since then, Jackson-Hamill has received a rather lukewarm response from a large section of the MMA fanbase, who seem to decry the fight as uninteresting or boring. And I have to tell you, fans and friends… I’m just not seeing it. And I think everyone needs to stop complaining about this fight.
I understand some of the hesitation regarding this fight, sure. Even as a big fan of both Jackson and Hamill, I can admit that this fight isn’t as high-value or as eagerly anticipated as the original UFC 130 main event. That was a huge fight that got pulled, and so of course I can understand why people are a bit upset about it. But that’s pretty much where the mutual understanding ends and the confusion begins.
Why does everyone think this fight is going to suck or be boring? I just don’t get it. I know why some people think it’ll be an uneventful fight…but those people are wrong. Don’t believe me? Allow me to dissect the cynics’ main arguments as I perceive them. We’ll start with something I see all the time: Matt Hamill is a boring fighter.
To which I say: what Matt Hamill have you been watching? Certainly not the one that’s in the UFC.
Sure, Matt Hamill is a wrestling-based fighter. Sure, wrestling-based fighters have some degree of stigma attached to them, however inadvertently, based on their perceived penchant for going to boring decisions. But Matt Hamill is not that type of fighter, he’s never been that type of fighter, and leading into this fight with Jackson, I have no earthly idea why so many people take him as that type of fighter.
The results speak for themselves: Matt Hamill has fought 11 times in the UFC and only lost twice. He’s faced some very tough challenges in that time: Michael Bisping, Rich Franklin, Mark Munoz, Jon Jones, and more. He’s currently on a five-fight win-streak with two stoppages, two decisions, and one DQ. The fact that Matt Hamill has been to a decision in his two most-recent fights shouldn’t overshadow the fact that he’s finished a majority of his fights, with six (T)KOs throughout his career. And to top it all off, all six of those (T)KOs occurred in either the first or second round.
Granted, many people still have a problem with Matt Hamill “beating” Jon Jones by Disqualification. But the situation is as cut-and-dry as they come: Jon Jones destroyed Matt Hamill, and then he got a little too excited and started throwing some illegal elbows. To those that still hold this win against Matt Hamill, my response is very simple: Jon Jones may have destroyed Matt Hamill, but Jon Jones destroys everybody. Get over it.
Other than Matt Hamill being a boring fighter, another common criticism I’ve heard surrounding this match is that Quinton Jackson just doesn’t want to fight anymore. And while that’s a critique that’s not without some merit, it’s frankly being grossly over-blown.
It’s true that Quinton Jackson appears to be heading towards the end of his fighting career. It’s true that he’s stated in multiple interviews that he’s not Randy Couture and doesn’t envision himself competing past the age of 40. It’s even true that Jackson hasn’t looked too impressive in his two most-recent outings.
All of that is true, but so is this: Matt Hamill has lit a fire under Quinton Jackson, and with the ring rust now more or less shaken off, Jackson can get back to doing what he does best: putting on great fights.
Let’s not forget that before his recent two-fight dry-spell, Jackson had delivered some awesome fights in the UFC. Let’s not forget that Quinton Jackson is a former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion, and was the man that dethroned Chuck Liddell. Let’s not forget that despite all his flaws, Jackson remains a very popular and marketable star. Quinton Jackson, taken solely by himself, is a worthy main event star.
At the end of the day, it’s not easy being a realist and an optimist at the same time, but I’d like to consider myself both. This is one of those rare times where both the realist in me and the optimist in me are in agreement. Realistically, this fight has a better chance of being a quality main event than an underwhelming mismatch: you’ve got a very hungry Matt Hamill facing a Quinton Jackson that wants to put him in his place. And if these two bring out the best in each other (and that’s the optimist talking), we’re going to get a fantastic fight. So stop worrying, and most importantly… stop complaining.
