Tuesday, November 10, 2009

By Isaac Kuhlman

  Fedor "The Last Emperor" Emelianenko fought Brett Rogers on Strikeforce's CBS-televised MMA card on Saturday night live on free television, and the result was a devastating second-round knock out that had Rogers on his back not knowing where he was. The broadcast was an internationally televised event that showcased Emelianenko on national, American television for the first time. The show got a 4.04 million viewers average, and the main event drew 5.46 million viewers to see "The Last Emperor" make claim to his throne.

  For anyone in the MMA world who is somehow in the dark about the accomplishments of Emelianenko, just know that he is the pound-for-pound toughest human being in the world, and that he has not lost an MMA contest in 9 years (the one loss was a cut stoppage after 19 seconds of a fight from an illegal elbow that should've been ruled a no contest). In fact, Emelianenko has only lost one bout in any competition in that time span--that being the World Combat Sambo Championships that he lost to the eventual champion of the tournament in 2008.

  During preparation for this fight, the soft spoken Emelianenko was married to his long-time girlfriend, Marina, in their hometown of Stary Oskol, Russia--a city of about 220,000 people or the equivalent to the city of Reno, NV.

  It was a big win for Emelianenko, but by no means even close to the level of competition he has faced in his career. Rogers looked to gas out pretty quickly, and when he made the mistake of dropping his hands and showing his weakness, Emelianenko capitalized with a knockout right hand to Rogers' jaw. A couple of more punches while on his back, and Emelianenko put an end to the fight. The fight was stopped at 1:48 of round 2.

  After watching Emelianenko for the past 6 years (I didn't realize it had been so long), I can say that he is absolutely the most dynamic all-around fighter the world has ever seen. In hand-to-hand combat, he is probably the world's most deadly weapon. I'm surprised the Russian government has kept him locked away for a Doomsday showdown with Brock Lesnar for the fate of the world.

  For his win, Emelianenko will likely face Alistair Overeem for the Strikeforce Heavyweight Championship sometime next year, but it looks like Fedor may also want to fight on the New Year's Eve card in Japan. Whether or not that will occur is still up in the air, but this win looked easy enough to be able to make that happen if Emelianenko wants. Either way, all the people that say Fedor Emelianenko is overrated or not fighting "the best in the world" is simply brainwashed by the UFC to thinking that Brock Lesnar is the best in the world. Lesnar is definitely top 10, but what if he loses to Shane Carwin or Cain Valasquez or a second time to Mir or Couture...then what? Was Lesnar just a flash-in-the-pan, and now one of these guys are better than Emelianenko? I wouldn't say that. The facts are that NO ONE has beaten Emelianenko in MMA. NO ONE.

Note: I have watched the Tsuyoshi Kohsaka fight that Fedor "lost." If that's going to be a true loss, then Kohsaka shouldn't have evaded Emelianenko for 5 years only to get beaten to a pulp in the rematch. Also, it was an abomination as far as fight standards are concerned, and if anyone disagrees, please watch the footage. Yeah, that's unbelievable. Also, elbows were illegal in the contest and that's what actually hit Fedor in the eye. Anyway, I digress.