Since losing his UFC debut to Vitor Belfort in May 2013, Luke Rockhold has been on a devastating run. He has finished all five of his opponents, three by submission and two with strikes, and only one has made it past the midway point of the second round.
Chris Weidman, the undefeated champion who had dethroned the great Anderson Silva, dropped his belt to the Californian in devastating fashion at UFC 194 in December.
Weidman was the literal and figurative successor to Silva, the man who defeated him and an embodiment of how MMA had changed since Silva began his epic run atop the middleweight division. Weidman is grit, whereas Silva was flash. Weidman is a wrestler by trade, whereas Silva was a striker.
And it’s hard to imagine a greater contrast than the one between Long Island, New York, and Curitiba, Brazil.
But is it Rockhold, not Weidman, who’s destined to be the next longtime middleweight king and Silva’s true successor?
Bleacher Report’s Mike Chiappetta and Patrick Wyman have some thoughts on Rockhold’s potential, his future and where he might stand in the pantheon of middleweight greats leading up to the first defense of his title at UFC 199 against Michael Bisping on Saturday.
Patrick Wyman: I can recall some heated discussions in the MMA sphere back in 2011 and 2012 as to who was the better middleweight prospect: the Serra-Longo-trained prodigy, Chris Weidman, or the then-newly crowned Strikeforce middleweight champion, Luke Rockhold.
I always came down on the Rockhold side of the equation.
That opinion looked pretty silly in 2013, though, when Weidman had blasted the clowning Silva to win the title, while Rockhold had just eaten a whole mouthful of Vitor Belfort’s heel.
When Weidman defeated Silva again later that year and cemented himself atop the division, it seemed clear that he would rule the roost for the foreseeable future. His title defenses over Lyoto Machida and Belfort only reinforced that impression.
But then Rockhold came along and took the belt without ever really finding himself in trouble after slicing through his four opponents following Belfort like a hot knife through butter.
It’s hard for any discussion about the future of the division not to become a referendum on the relative merits of Weidman and Rockhold. They’re both 31 in a division full of fighters on the wrong side of 35, they’re both proven as elite talents and they’ve both been champions.
They were even scheduled to rematch this weekend at UFC 199 before Weidman’s neck injury grew serious enough to require a replacement.
So, Mike, I put two questions to you. First, is it unreasonable to place Weidman-surpassing expectations on a fighter who, after all, has yet to actually defend his belt? And second, how do you weigh the relative merits of Rockhold and Weidman as champions, whether in terms of in-cage action or promotional potential?
Mike Chiappetta: Is it unreasonable? No. Unfortunately, MMA is a sport where conclusions must be drawn on small sample sizes. A good UFC career might last 20 fights. By comparison, 20 games isn’t even one month of a baseball season.
Rockhold-Weidman lasted more than 18 minutes, and there were a lot of observations to be taken from it. Is it the end of the debate? Not necessarily, but Rockhold certainly showed some areas of superiority.
He’s a sharper striker, his ground game is more punishing and, overall, he’s simply a more fluid fighter than Weidman. So if he’s better at all these things—and beat Weidman on top of it—it’s fair to wonder if he is the true heir to the throne.
We may be afflicted by the recency effect here, but I would tend to say, “Yes.” I think the sport is at a stage where athletes are beginning to raise the levels of performance, and Rockhold is at the vanguard of the movement.
He’s always been good, but over the last few years, he has managed to put all of the pieces of his offense together more seamlessly.
In the cage, he’s certainly more dynamic than Weidman, although away from it, neither has the sort of electric personality that leads to true superstardom.
Rockhold’s best argument for continued division dominance is the fact that he is young in an old division. While Weidman is only a few months older than Rockhold, he’s had a series of injuries over the last two years, capped off by a herniated disc in his neck, which sounds both incredibly painful and worrisome.
Whenever athletes get neck injuries, careers are in jeopardy, so it’s certainly reasonable to put Rockhold ahead of Weidman for that reason alone. Don’t you agree, Patrick?
Wyman: I have to agree with your assessment of Weidman and Rockhold, and I don’t think it’s just recency at play. You hit on the roots of the issues comparing the two: athleticism and injury history.
Without exaggeration, Rockhold is one of the most physically gifted fighters we’ve ever seen in MMA. He’s enormous (6’3″, 185 lbs), lightning-fast, physically strong enough to spar regularly with heavyweight and light heavyweight champions, and possesses vicious power in every strike he throws.
Unlike most fighters who own that kind of explosiveness, Rockhold has also shown the cardio necessary to fight five hard rounds, so things don’t get any easier in the later rounds.
As good as Rockhold is as a striker, he’s even better on the ground. The whole tenor of the Weidman fight changed after Rockhold locked up a front headlock and swept to top position when Weidman shot in on him. The champion’s confidence in his takedown game crumbled after that.
As it turns out, a Weidman who can’t blend his wrestling with his striking is a far less effective fighter.
Once Rockhold got on top later in the fight, it was effectively over. It’s important to bear in mind that Weidman was considered a grappling prodigy who competed well at the Abu Dhabi Combat Club Submission Wrestling World Championship, and Rockhold ate him alive on the mat.
I seriously doubt anybody in the division can survive for long with Rockhold on top or in scrambles. He choked Bisping with one arm, for crying out loud, and turned Tim Boetsch into a pretzel.
All of this is a roundabout way of saying that Rockhold is an unreal talent, even compared to a three-time defending champion who’s far from ungifted in his own right.
In the long run, the injuries are a far greater concern for Weidman than any of these skill or athletic deficiencies. Rockhold has had some issues in his own right, but Weidman missed an entire year between 2012 and 2013 with a shoulder injury, suffered a knee injury early in 2014, broke his hand later that year and now the serious neck injury is the latest woe in a career filled with them.
Where I part ways with you, Mike, is in the two fighters’ relative potential for stardom outside the cage.
Weidman hasn’t broken through with the public despite years of exposure and media placements, and it seems clear that his personality just doesn’t resonate in any meaningful way. Rockhold, on the other hand, does seem to possess a much greater degree of charisma.
Given enough opportunities, is it unreasonable to think that Rockhold might become a viable draw, if not a superstar? If you were the UFC, how would you go about promoting him?
Chiappetta: Don’t get me wrong, I think Rockhold has some star qualities. He’s a champion, he’s a physical marvel and he’s a pretty handsome fellow, which counts in matters of marketing.
In the right hands—meaning willing and determined ones—all of that can translate at the box office. But the UFC has so many athletes and titles to market that it tends to focus most of its resources on the easy sells, the grudges and personalities with viral power and the ability to go wide.
Rockhold isn’t that kind of draw, at least not yet.
Part of this is because the fight world at large is still not completely sure what to make of him. At times, he’s soft-spoken and quiet. At other times, his personality borders on arrogance.
While neither is necessarily a bad thing in an alpha sport, the dichotomy of his personality leads to conflicting feelings in fans. And with personality being one of the key drivers of stardom, he’s stunting his own progress.
Another problem is that he rarely says anything that resonates. I mean, can you instantly think of anything he’s said that is memorable? Instead, it’s usually generic pre-fight talk that gets swallowed up by whatever the next wave of headlines is.
Promotion isn’t magic, but it requires a certain mix of ingredients to reach superstar status. The rub here is that some of those ingredients cannot be artificially made. Rockhold has not yet found the right mix.
If I was the UFC, I would actually focus on selling Rockhold to the mainstream first.
This is a guy who comes from a family of pro athletes and has the looks and size to dwarf most Hollywood leading men, so I don’t think he’d be a hard sell for talk shows, magazines, etc. I would create a commercial/mini action movie with him as the star to sell his fight, and I’d position him as the heir to the division once ruled by the most dominant champ MMA has ever seen.
That’s a start, but superstardom is not completely in Rockhold’s control.
What he can control is what he does in the cage, and he’s got the goods there. Shouldn’t that be what he focuses on, anyway? We’re seeing more and more fighters, from Ronda Rousey to Paige VanZant to even Michael Bisping, getting interested in show business.
There’s nothing wrong with diversified interests, but Rockhold’s focus should be on the ass-kicking business.
Wyman: I think you’re spot-on with the idea that mainstream audiences, perhaps more so than MMA-specific viewers, are likely to be the prime market for Rockhold. His name alone lends itself to catchy slogans.
If we’re being honest, big, handsome dudes from Northern California with incredible physical gifts and a straight-up awesome highlight reel aren’t exactly the hardest commodities to sell.
The fact that we’ve devoted a bare minimum of discussion to his title defense against Bisping at UFC 199 says a great deal about both the fight and his future. After all, Rockhold demolished him 18 months ago, and little has changed since then.
The building blocks are there to become at least a solid draw with a good media profile, but as you pointed out, he needs a little more on the resume side. “Dominant middleweight champion” is an easier sell to the kinds of mainstream media outlets that would offer the biggest return on investment than “little-known but handsome and pretty charismatic guy who just won a title.”
It’ll be interesting to see what the UFC does with Rockhold after this fight. He has the potential, and if he can stick around, fight regularly and cut a few good promos, he has what it takes to be Silva’s true successor.
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