Examples of fighters who inexplicably aged overnight?

[sonhow]

Randy Couture.

His end of career was pretty...mid for an old man.
He did have a layoff between Gonzaga and Lesner though.

 

[LostMyBlackBelt]

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The move up to fight Ruiz was a mistake. The weight loss back down messed him up.

 

[sonhow]

As for Volk well you said it yourself. He might look old and now hed have a reason for it in that ko loss by Islam. Seems pretty Wanderlei Silva type of deal if he gets knocked out by Ilia as well.

 

[Striker Fox]

Alexander Gustafsson. He dropped off a cliff. I expected more from him.

Wonder what happened to him? He took 20 months off after dominating Glover, then came back and fought a pulsing Jones (Jones failed a drug test right before Gus 2 but the fight wasn't cancelled), and never looked the same.

His prime was almost as short as Hendricks'.

 

[sonofjay817]

Smh man the fall of RJJ was like watching superman die in front of you can't think of a more shocking moment other than maybe Silva vs Weidman

Yeah, I totally agree.

 

[michi972]

So I'm not talking about a guy like Tony Ferguson whos fighting style was always hectic and on the edge of losing, who had injuries and had the incident with the cord, who went through tough years mentally that eventually lead to a breakdown, and whos physique clearly declined throughout the years.

Or JDS whos received two life-altering beating from Cain in a 10 month period. Two losses that would not only explain a decrease in physical performance, but would also explain a big decrease in confidence and perhaps also motivation to be the best. Lets not forget the Stipe war right after.

Or GSP who had multiple knee surgeries and was gone for a year and then came back much bulkier and more flatfooted.

Or Chuck who liked to party and do bumps more than he liked to train.

Or Hendricks (probably also Weidman, and probably a shitton more) who suddenly got much worse post-USADA.


No I mean someone who was on the top of the world one day, didnt have anything crazy going on in their lives, wasnt a party animal, didnt get brutally KO'd or beaten up, who suddenly became much worse. So they didnt gradually become worse with age as you would generally expect, no I mean on top of the world one day, and without any good reason just didnt had it the next.


The reason why I ask this is because the "aging overnight" thing keeps getting parroted as some kind of undeniable fact. I'm seeing it now especially a lot when people discuss Volk and him turning 35 and how that his age might play a role. So I understand the concerns of the headkick KO playing a role, but I dont understand this talk of him suddenly becoming much worse because he turned 35. He looked arguably as fast and as fast-twitchy as Yair just 6 months ago, but because he entered that age that Luke Thomas is obsessed with hes suddenly gonna experience a dramatical physical decline?


The only example I can come up with is Woodley, and most of that seemed mental more than anything.

Hendricks could be usada, but he got FAT too much between fights....

Condit. Goes from near beating Lawler to getting choked by Maia and getting destroyed by Magny. Hell, the Condit that fought Lawler would’ve beaten the breaks off of Maia and Magny. That’s what’s sad.

Same could be said about Lawler too. Both guys were never the same after that fight.

Maia would beat him, but he wouldn't lose to Magny

 

[fortheo]

Condit. Goes from near beating Lawler to getting choked by Maia and getting destroyed by Magny. Hell, the Condit that fought Lawler would’ve beaten the breaks off of Maia and Magny. That’s what’s sad.

Same could be said about Lawler too. Both guys were never the same after that fight.

I love condit, but Maia was always a horrible match up for any version of condit. Having no TDD and facing Maia is basically game over.

 

[Harlekin]

The move up to fight Ruiz was a mistake. The weight loss back down messed him up.

True in hindsight. Retiring then would've been best for legacy.
He was the first in 106 years to capture middleweight to heavy weight titles. Started as super welter. Also won smw. Too bad he didn't get a proper cruiser title.

Bob Fitzsimmons (165 pounds) did it against James Corbett(178 pounds) with a weird 10-0-3 record. So much for heavyweight, well different times.
They didn't or marginally cut weight back then. So they would be feather and lightweights in the UFC.

 

[surgeyou1]

Barao.

 

[Necrocrawler]

Renan Barao all day

 

[markys00]

There is no one in the MW division that has a style like Sean's.

Izzy could fight the same way he fought Sean and find success against others. Sean just had answers for everything Izzy did. Most would not.

He is in his mid 30s now though so he's probably going to start slowing down and become more beatable very soon

Chris curtis?

 

[Zach The Maniac]

Rory McDonald

 

[Lawrence]

So I'm not talking about a guy like Tony Ferguson whos fighting style was always hectic and on the edge of losing, who had injuries and had the incident with the cord, who went through tough years mentally that eventually lead to a breakdown, and whos physique clearly declined throughout the years.

Or JDS whos received two life-altering beatings from Cain in a 10 month period. Two losses that would not only explain a decrease in physical performance, but would also explain a big decrease in confidence and perhaps also motivation to be the best. Lets not forget the Stipe war right after.

Or GSP who had multiple knee surgeries and was gone for a year and then came back much bulkier and more flatfooted.

Or Chuck who liked to party and do bumps more than he liked to train.

Or Hendricks (probably also Weidman, and probably a shitton more) who suddenly got much worse post-USADA.


No I mean someone who was on the top of the world one day, didnt have anything crazy going on in their lives, wasnt a party animal, didnt get brutally KO'd or beaten up, who suddenly became much worse. So they didnt gradually become worse with age as you would generally expect, no I mean on top of the world one day, and without any good reason just didnt had it the next.


The reason why I ask this is because the "aging overnight" thing keeps getting parroted as some kind of undeniable fact. I'm seeing it now especially a lot when people discuss Volk and him turning 35 and how his age might play a role. So I understand the concerns of the headkick KO playing a role, but I dont understand this talk of him suddenly becoming much worse because he turned 35. He looked arguably as fast and as fast-twitchy as Yair just 6 months ago, but because he entered that age that Luke Thomas is obsessed with hes suddenly gonna experience a dramatical physical decline?


The only example I can come up with is Woodley, and most of that seemed mental more than anything.

I think a good example would be Carlos Condit.

I think his heart just broke when the lost the decision against Lawler.

No USADA timeline questions. No major injury, no hard living party stuff.

He was Elite by any standard, and then suddenly he wasn't.

 

[Starman]

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That is the quintessential example right there. For Roy, there’s actually an explanation for it. His nutritionist for the Ruiz fight (Mackie Shilstone) actually told everyone what was going to happen to Roy right before it happened.

Roy brought Mackie onboard to help him bulk up for the Ruiz fight. Mackie helps fighters bulk up by adding muscle, not fat. Roy didn’t keep Mackie onboard once he decided to cut back down to light heavyweight to fight Tarver. Mackie said Roy was cutting weight the wrong way (cutting muscle instead of fat) and then it was going to have catastrophic consequence. Which it did.

A lot of fighters, including some in the UFC, wreck their body this way (like Diego Sanchez). Cutting fat is one thing. Cutting muscle is another.

 

[Private Whatley]

BJ, Matt Hughes, Lawler, Woodley and list goes on.

Matt Hughes had like 40 fights and represented an early iteration of the MMA skillset that ran into trouble against younger, more evolved fighters, including guys like Koscheck who were credentially superior in his area of expertise. He also came up training in an era where guys beat the fuck out of each other in the gym to prepare for their fights.

The same could be said for BJ and Lawler. BJ certainly fell off a cliff but he was one of the old school guys who often fought way above his natural weight class. He was also notorious for not training seriously and treating his body like garbage between fights. Lawler’s career was remarkable in that he fought so many different opponents for so many years in multiple promotions before finally starting to fade.

Woodley is a good one although it also makes sense seeing as he was 36-37 when he dropped the title to Usman and proceeded to lose his remaining fights. Generally speaking, the weight classes of 170 and below aren’t kind to older fighters, especially the ones also aged in gym years.

 

[Gamer2k4]

Israel Adesanya... Used to be the best of the best. Now he won't win a single fight facing top 10. Reflexes are first to go and he relies on those exclusively because of his style.

That's just recency bias. How about we wait until he loses two fights in a row, at least?

 

[orca]

32 year old prime fedor magically looked normal in a drug testing org
hey im not accusing him but its obvious

 

[Holyherb420]

most pride fighters when they moved to the UFC. Its almost like they stopped taking their vitamins

 

[HeffDoesWant]

Barão is always the answer

Edit: actually I'm an idiot, he got crushed once and lost the aura. No longer could pull out spinny killing shit.
Kinda like Anderson.

Imo more like JDS than what TS was asking about.

 

[sonofjay817]

That is the quintessential example right there. For Roy, there’s actually an explanation for it. His nutritionist for the Ruiz fight (Mackie Shilstone) actually told everyone what was going to happen to Roy right before it happened.

Roy brought Mackie onboard to help him bulk up for the Ruiz fight. Mackie helps fighters bulk up by adding muscle, not fat. Roy didn’t keep Mackie onboard once he decided to cut back down to light heavyweight to fight Tarver. Mackie said Roy was cutting weight the wrong way (cutting muscle instead of fat) and then it was going to have catastrophic consequence. Which it did.

A lot of fighters, including some in the UFC, wreck their body this way (like Diego Sanchez). Cutting fat is one thing. Cutting muscle is another.

I've never heard that about Roy and Mackie. Very interesting. Thanks for that. I totally agree with you about fighters cutting weight the wrong way. I'm always hearing statements made that betray a wrong mindset toward weight cutting saying X fighter could never make Y weight class again. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Conor could in theory make featherweight again given sufficient time and strategy.