Fedor's Strengths and Weaknesses

krelianx

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Fedor had certain skills that were anomalous, partially as a result of having a quite odd body type, with enormous upper body strength, short neck, and slender legs. He was extremely fast, nimble, and powerful, and had surprisingly good accuracy. He kept his hands low and had a steady bounce, moved forward with lounging hooks to close the distance, get the upper body clinch, take you down, and then pound until the submission became available. And he had the grappling depth, transitions, and speed to pull it off. Particularly, his armbar transitions from both top and guard were extraordinary. And his gameplanning was without par for his time: playing the guard game against Nog, then doing a throw and stand in the third match... he was insanely explosive, powerful, skilled, and dynamic.

He was also overrated by some who thought he was utterly invincible. He was also at times quite reckless, and if one could resist his forward pressure he faced trouble later when he got into trades. It almost costed him the fight with Fujita already earlier in his title run. He later tried to replicate his top guard game that he used against Nog against Werdum, but the latter's guard was of a different caliber ,and he couldn't shove the triangle off, particularly once he starting losing musculature. He became a bit too in love with his kickboxing later, and relegated his sambo and wrestling game. He had a really tough time when Antonio Silva landed on top of him being 300lbs and having excellent jitz; and Hendo caught him off a big hook off the cage. I would have liked to see him against guys with size and grappling depth like Barnett, Ricco, Cormier, Cain, Sergei, etc. I think Prime Cain would have been a really incredible fight. But I think he would have beat guys like Lesnar, Randy, and even Stipe. JDS and Overeem would have been tough one as well.

Still, the GOAT HW, just on accomplishment alone.
 
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Not too many weaknesses other than being undersized, having skin that was easily damaged, and being somewhat reckless. But his reckless approach combined with extreme ferocity made him the most exciting fighter on the planet.
 
Not the most amazing guard against seasoned top players, but made up for it with explosiveness and lighting fast submissions.

Too many injuries and religion really took its toll on his style later in his career.
 
Fedor has certain skills that were anomalous, partially as a result of having a quite odd body time, with enormous upper body strength and slender legs. He was extremely fast, nimble, and powerful, and had surprisingly good accuracy. He kept his hands low and had a steady bounce, moved forward with lounging hooks to close the distance, get the upper body clinch, take you down, and then pound until the submission became available. And he had the grappling depth, transitions, and speed to pull it off. And his extraordinary gameplanning was without par for his time: playing the guard game against Nog, then doing a throw and stand in the third match... he was insanely explosive, powerful, skilled, and dynamic.

He was also overrated by some who thought he was utterly invincible. He was also at times quite reckless, and if one could resist his forward pressure he faced trouble later when he got into trades. It almost costed him the fight with Fujita already earlier. He tried to replicate his top guard game that he used against Nog against Werdum, but the latter's guard was of a different caliber ,and he couldn't shove the triangle off, particularly once he starting losing musculature. He became a bit too in love with his kickboxing later, and relegated his sambo and wrestling game. He had a really tough time when Antonio Silva landed on top of him being 300lbs and having excellent jitz; and Hendo caught him off a big hook off the cage. I would have liked to see him against guys with size and grappling depth like Barnett, Ricco, Cormier, Cain, Sergei, etc. I think Prime Cain would have been a really incredible fight. But I think he would have beat guys like Lesnar, Randy, and even Stipe. JDS and Overeem would have been tough one as well.

Still, the GOAT HW, just on accomplishment alone.

His main coach said that the big switch - where he stopped wrestling and using ground game - came due to back injuries. In other words, apparently it's not his love for the stand up that caused him to drop the use of ground game, but the injuries.

Those injuries, unfortunately, turned him into a one-dimensional fighter - a far cry from the well rounded war machine in his prime. The fact that he still has more wins than losses post-prime is a testament to his stand up game - even back then, we all knew that Fedor was not particularly amazing in stand up nor his ground game, but he was well above average in both, which made him completely unpredictable and unstoppable, since he was able to utilize his opponent's weaknesses and if his standup ever faltered, take the fight to the ground and finish it there with relative ease. When he lost the use of his ground game due to injuries, we only got to see his stand up - and well.... it really was above average, but not good enough to prevent losses - many of which came on the ground, since he practiced so little of it later on.
 
His main skill was that he was excellent in transitions, he created chaos and thrived in that chaos

Fedor's fights are Chaotic, even his early disciplined fights show a tendency for chaos
 
I'm not sure about "weaknesses", that's a harsh word. There are things fighters can always be better at.

I would say something comparatively that Fedor would struggle with might be speed/smaller fighters. He is usually the smallest guy but his skill set and attributes work out in a way where it doesn't hinder him or it is possibly advantageous compared to his peers.

When I think of Fedor "in trouble" I think of him against other smaller faster guys - Lindland, Henderson, Arona, Randleman. Some of these fights are really short and just one moment things, but for instance - the reason why Randleman was disposed of easily was more because of technique from both parties. Fedor of course was a bit past it when he fought Henderson, but still a good sample size for information - he wasn't a can.

I then think of what I call Fedor's marquee victories (Nogueira, Crocop, Arvloski, Sylvia). The former 2 are seen as his main accomplishments in PRIDE (Coleman is one too, but might be more of an old guard vs new guard type of thing) and the latter was validation that the UFC > PRIDE in HW was not true. Of those fights, and I could be misremembering - I believe Crocop was the hardest fight for him and Crocop is the smallest and fastest of those guys.

The easiest fight was Sylvia who is really slow. Nogueria is not big for a heavyweight but is noticeably slow which tells me that maybe speed and not so much reach might be the first step to building a "problem" for Fedor.


I've noticed that there is some passive language that almost suggest Fedor as a two weight champion. It's not uncommon in P4P discussions for a pro Fedor argument to revolve around how he dominated HW's while being the size of a LHW. I always found this argument to not have much validity because it kind of assumes that Fedor would dominate everyone at 205 if he dropped down, but that isn't how weight classes work.

Some fighters are better fighting "undersized" - it's more of a preference thing where even though being undersized is good for the minority it is more a preference. I am not sure if Fedor had to cut weight he would inherently be as good at 205 as he was at HW.

When I think of Fedor's strengths I think of him in a scramble and in transition - it would make sense that hypothetically, if his speed advantage was not as big it would dis-proportionally affect him. When I think of something that could perhaps be a weakness, like maybe Fedor's defense is not the best but he is so much faster than his opponents it doesn't matter - maybe the chances of him getting "Fujita'd" would become larger if he had a large sample size of opponents more around his athletic stature.

I would have loved to see Fedor fight more 205ers.

This is more of an observation. In a vacuum GOAT candidates do not really have "weaknesses". It's like asking what are Superman's weaknesses, he doesn't really have any in the grand scheme of things - even Kryptonite is a pretty ineffective way to kill someone who can knock your head off in a fraction of a second.
 
His main coach said that the big switch - where he stopped wrestling and using ground game - came due to back injuries. In other words, apparently it's not his love for the stand up that caused him to drop the use of ground game, but the injuries.

Those injuries, unfortunately, turned him into a one-dimensional fighter - a far cry from the well rounded war machine in his prime. The fact that he still has more wins than losses post-prime is a testament to his stand up game - even back then, we all knew that Fedor was not particularly amazing in stand up nor his ground game, but he was well above average in both, which made him completely unpredictable and unstoppable, since he was able to utilize his opponent's weaknesses and if his standup ever faltered, take the fight to the ground and finish it there with relative ease. When he lost the use of his ground game due to injuries, we only got to see his stand up - and well.... it really was above average, but not good enough to prevent losses - many of which came on the ground, since he practiced so little of it later on.

Interesting that his coach said this. I have thought the same thing. Very hard to train grappling with say an injured fist. Much easier to train standup
 
Fedor fights were something else man... In the days where MMA was Karate guy vs Kickboxer, or Jiu Jitsu guy vs a Bouncer, when Fedor fought you got to see everything - Lightning fast striking combos, clinch, amazing takedown legs flyint through the air, one of the best ground and pounds you ever saw, and then a lightning fast submission locked in... I remember truly being like WTF am i witnessing here, i was stunned, no other fighter ever got me feeling nearly the same way... Not that there werent more skilled fighters or anything, but at that time, seeing all of that from one guy... Magic...
 
Fedor didn’t fall in love with his stand up, he sustained multiple back and neck injuries. You could tell this before his coach confirmed it just by watching him move.
 
Firstly Fedor was the fastest HW that theres ever been. Big Nog said he was the fastest fighter hes ever fought. Chael Sonnen said he was blown away by how fast, old, Bellator Fedor still was. Yuji Shimada the legendary Pride FC ref whos refereed hundreds of fights said Fedor was not only the fastest HW hes ever seen but the fastest fighter hes ever seen. He said he noticed Fedor's speed the most during moments of transitions from striking to grappling. He said watching Fedor go from throwing strikes to ragdolling his opponents was like watching an animal.

On top of being the fastest HW ever, Fedor was the most well rounded HW ever and had the most dynamic and comprehensive skillset this sport has ever seen at HW and maybe even across all weight classes, depending on who you ask.

A grappler who could spar with world class, hard hitting pro boxers like Lebedev and land a lightning fast right cross like a pro boxer would. Nobody in the HW division today has a cross this good and this fast and this was old Strikeforce Fedor. Not only was he technical and understood distance and timing but he could also hit the brawl button at any time if he needed to. This is rare because most fighters usually can only do one or the other.



Fedor had world class Sambo and Judo and was on the Russian national Judo team. He had no problem with ragdolling a 250lb man. He took down prime Mirko almost easily with finesse while Olympic level, powerful wrestlers like Coleman and Randleman couldnt. Fedor had a lifetime of knowledge in throws and takedowns and even in his later years was pulling off shit like this:



You won't see any HWs in the UFC today pulling off anything like this. It requires years and years of training, experience and expertise in grappling and again, this was old, Strikeforce Fedor.

Once on the ground Fedor had the best and most fierce ground and pound this sport has ever seen. I could post gifs of him bouncing prime Nogs head off the mat like a basketball but what he did to Herring is still slept on in terms of speed and ferocity. Just listen to the sound of these GnP shots.



On top of the striking, grappling and brutal GnP, Fedor had slick submissions and could armlock someone from his back with the hip-speed of a break dancer like he did to Coleman. Coleman has spent lots of time on the mat with high level grapplers. Not even Big Nog subbed him with such swiftness. Even a Renzo Gracie black belt in BJJ like Stephan Bonnar never came close to submitting 50 year old Coleman. Even Shogun who is a Cristiano Marcelo black belt in BJJ and who has spent multiple camps training with Demian Maia never came close to submitting old Coleman. It shows how swift Fedors armlocks were and how ahead of his time he was by pulling off such slick subs back in 2004.



Besides the skills Fedor had absurd reflexes. He checked Mirkos fastest and hardest low kick with no feel out process in the opening moments of the fight like it was nothing. You don't see those kind of checking reflexes in MMA, you see it in professional kickboxing and professional Muay Thai.

Screenshot_20221021-213811_Gallery.jpg

It's wild to think that a grappling based fighter like Fedor had enough skill, ferocity and durability in the stand up department to trade with prime Cop for extended periods of time and even get the better of him and actually walk him down and make him run away. This was truly unprecedented even by today's standards.

Screenshot_20221021-213950_Gallery.jpg

You can't forget Fedors toughness and durability that came with all that skill and athleticism. He got thrown through the air and slammed on his neck by Randleman and recovered moments later and submitted him. Most people would die if this happened to them. Truly remarkable toughness and durability.

randlemanslam.jpg

All in all when you combine his skills, his speed, his toughness, his intensity, his durability and his well roundedness there is no doubt that there has never been anyone close to him and there probably never will be. Easily the greatest and most well rounded HW fighter ever and one of the best fighters to ever live.

When it comes to weaknesses, Fedor could be reckless at times which made his fights exciting. He didnt play it safe and often took risks and this reckless approach has cost him.

His grappling off his back wasn't as good as his other skills. He could still pull off amazing armlocks and explosive sweeps from bottom and great scrambling ability, but his top game was much better than his bottom game. For example against Arona he resorted to hold on to Aronas head to stall while Arona was on top of him in mount and half guard position. Fedor was strong enough to pull this off and get away with it but generally, this was low skilled technique.

Another weakness I saw in him was his tendency to get a little bit lazy when it came to giving up underhooks which resulted in him giving up his back and him being put into dangerous situations. This was by far his biggest weakness and it resulted in him being KOd by Hendo and him getting slammed on his neck by Randleman. Below is an example of this tendency in a grappling session with Gegard Mousasi.



Sometimes he got away with it and other times he didnt, especially as he got older. Overall Fedor is still the fastest, most skilled, most well rounded and mentally toughest HW fighter I've ever seen with the best reflexes.

The fact that he had such an advanced and comprehensive skillset 17 years ago speaks volumes of how good he was and how ahead of his time he was. The #1 P4P fighter in the world for 7 consecutive years. Truly a shame that most fans don't grasp how good he was because Dana White said so.
 
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Weaknesses? Only the law of averages catching up. I mean you cant ALWAYS win all the time?

<KhabibBS>

Ok maybe you can!
 
I like the first paragraph. And that he lost a lot of quality once he lost muscle mass since he was small from the get go.

Stipe is big I don't think that's an easy match up.

Heavyweights change their peak more then any weight category due to the nature of that size and damage.

He is apsolutly small and later on lacked a lot in muscle mass.
 
I like the first paragraph. And that he lost a lot of quality once he lost muscle mass since he was small from the get go.

Stipe is big I don't think that's an easy match up.

Heavyweights change their peak more then any weight category due to the nature of that size and damage.

He is apsolutly small and later on lacked a lot in muscle mass.


Prime Stipe would have had a chance against the older Strikeforce version of Fedor but would get knocked out pretty easily by 2003-2005 Fedor. Stipe got hit way too much.

He struggled badly with post Cain JDS who wasn't nearly as fast as prime Fedor was. He also got floored by Overeem who was Econoreem by that point with 3 losses by KO in the UFC.

If these versions of JDS and Reem could find Stipes chin with ease then so would prime Fedor. Only he was much faster than them and was a better grappler than them with insane chin, durabiltiy and toughness.
 
Prime Stipe would have had a chance against the older Strikeforce version of Fedor but would get knocked out pretty easily by 2003-2005 Fedor. Stipe got hit way too much.

He struggled badly with post Cain JDS who wasn't nearly as fast as prime Fedor was. He also got floored by Overeem who was Econoreem by that point with 3 losses by KO in the UFC. If these versions of JDS and Reem could find Stipes chin with ease then so would prime Fedor. Only he was much faster than them and was a better grappler than them with insane chin, durabiltiy and toughness.


And Fedor would have beaten Francis Nganou ?

Ecoreem was on a streak. Post Cain JDS was still strong at that point, finished Tai and Lewis after.

Fedor struggled mightily vs Rogers. Man had a problem vs big strong guys.
 
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