pride finals 2006 dude - mirko's win over josh

i saw the fight 100 times....and josh was taking a big punishment...but anyone else can see that mirko won by an eye poke in the ground?? josh say ahgg shitt, and mirko was not punching him...

 

Pointless thread lmfao... but yes, everybody saw what happened. Still, I don't think the majority of people (at least the ones with a brain in their head) really take that away from Cro Cop's win. He was destroying Barnett, I've never seen Barnett crumble to a shot like he did to that body shot to this day. It was inevitable. Even Josh said that the eye poke didn't really matter and that it was just Cro Cop's night. So yeah.

 

It was really amazing how Mirko was able to throw Josh around in their second fight, even mounting him at one point, I believe. Mirko's hips and base was really amazing; for a guy with no prior grappling background, he appeared to have an insane level of hip pressure and control.

 

For sure. That fight is honestly a little bit underrated. Not that it was an amazing fight or anything, but I've seen it dismissed as a boring fight by people... I guess because it was a Cro Cop decision win, which was a rare occurrence, but Cro Cop actually demonstrated a lot of different skills in that fight, as you mentioned.

 

Translation: Fight Pass trial activated.

 

I think people don't like to acknowledge the fight, because it is sort of uncomfortable to witness and acknowledge that a guy like CroCop can do what he did to a world-class grappler like Barnett. As someone with a grappling background, it doesn't sit well with me, but it happened and it is really impressive.

 

Barnett has a historic weakness against strikers who show some TDD

Rizzo, Cro Cop, Rothwell, Browne, Even Aleks E was whooping him before gassing.

Would have probably lost to prime Kharitonov, JDS, Arlovski and Oveerem too...,

 

That doesn't really address what was so impressive and unsettling about Mirko's performance. The point is that he actually controlled Barnett, a world-class grappler, on the ground. He had him in mount, in side-mount...he essentially outgrappled Barnett, as much as I hate to say it.

 

mirko is a very methodical fighter so instead of KOing barnett outright he just broke him down systematically

 

I mean, it happens sometimes and grappling is so dominant in the sport nowadays that I think you'll be okay! lol. I think it just shows how much Cro Cop evolved as a fighter. He came straight from K1 into MMA at a time when the sport itself was evolving and we saw the progression and evolution of him as a fighter as the years went on. He was learning on the spot.

From what I remember about the fight though, Barnett seemed content with just utilizing the clinch against Mirko, he wasn't really on top or in control on the ground much at all, and he also wasn't really trying to be. And there was even a moment where Barnett tried a catch wrestling throw on Cro Cop, but he fucked up and literally ended up mounted by Cro Cop lol. So yes, everything we've said about Cro Cop is true, but Josh also fucked up in that fight a few times (just skimmed through the fight real quick, and even towards the end, he tried the same over/under throw, but it was kind of a pathetic attempt and he just ended up on his back again)... He did great pressuring Cro Cop and utilizing the clinch and landing knees, but ultimately, he spent too much time on his back on the ground with Cro Cop on top and Cro Cop kinda took over in all aspects in the second half of the fight.

And I'm not sure if what you said is true exactly, maybe for you personally, but I don't really think people feel any type of way about Cro Cop pretty much out grappling Barnett. Cro Cop has a lot of haters but I think his fan base is waaaay stronger for the most part. I feel like that's something they would be quick to acknowledge, but the fight is completely ignored by pretty much everybody.

 

I'm not so sure about this honestly... Rizzo isn't exactly known for his amazing TDD. He fought some amazing wrestlers, but he's lost fights simply because of his lack of TDD/grappling abilities compared to his opponents. I don't wanna chuck the Rothwell loss up to Barnett being past his prime, but... it wasn't prime Barnett at the same time, and Rothwell is just a weird fighter who was on the best stretch of his career. It didn't really show a weakness in Barnett as a fighter. The Browne fight was literally just Barnett going for a takedown against the cage and then getting destroyed by those dumb Travis Browne elbows. Could have happened to anybody (and did happen to a few others), again, it wasn't necessarily a weakness shown by Barnett. I don't think these guys really have much better or worse TDD than a lot of the guys Barnett has beat.

Barnett was tough as fuck. A lot of fights on his record, he was actually losing or getting beat up before coming back and getting the win... he let fights go on way longer than they should have and was competitive with guys he should have had an easier time beating. I could give a few examples of this. But this goes back to the original topic of the thread, if Barnett didn't tap when he got poked in the eye, could he have beat Cro Cop? ... Who knows. I would say no, based on what we've seen of them fighting, and by Barnett's own account, it was just Cro Cop's night. Cro Cop just had his number, I don't really see how Barnett beats him. But it needs to be known that Barnett getting beat up and then getting the win... that's nothing new.

Also, he pretty much beat prime Sergei, it wasn't PRIDE Sergei (one could argue he wasn't in his prime in PRIDE), but I don't really like the implication that Sergei was past his prime in 2011 lol. He beat Arlovski but both were not in their prime... and the rest is just fantasy match-up/dumb/baseless speculation or assumptions which I don't personally like to entertain. Point is, I don't agree.

And "strikers who show some TDD" is such a broad and generic description of a fighter, it can apply to a plethora of fighters. Barnett's strength is his catch wrestling and overall grappling, so obviously it makes sense that he's not going to get out-grappled in the majority of his losses. Barnett would probably not be a good fighter if he genuinely had a weakness against "strikers who show some TDD"... so yeah.

 

Barnett submitted K-1 Sergei, not Sambo Sergei who would have KO'd him lol

Truth is Barnett mostly submitted journeymen and cans. His subs of Nastula, Hunt Aleks are subs over green fighters (their combined number of fights when they fought Barnett was less than Barnett's number of wins lol!!!!1111) and like I already said, if former prisoner Aleks didn't run out of gas he would have finished off Barnett. I am not going to talk about his other sub wins over guys like Kondo etc because frankly they are pathetic.

Maybe instead of saying strikers with some TDD I should have said strikers with some TDD or ground game expertise because pretty much any good striker who takes the other aspects of MMA seriously is gonna put a beating on Barnett.

Barnett is a guy that cultivated an image for himself as some kind of feared catch wrestler but his actual ability to takedown and submit elite fighters was lacking..he is a super tough well conditioned (proven history of peds) grappler that is fun to watch against less competition like Yoshida but when faced with well prepared elite fighters he is pretty limited.

The Cro Cop and Cormier fights were the expected outcomes of meeting well prepared elite fighters..I guess he also has a win over slow and plodding Nog whose style suited Barnett's style to a tee

 

You sound pretty dumb, man. No point in carrying on the discussion when the first thing you say is a guy Barnett submitted "would have" KO'd him if they had fought a few years prior. Followed by Aleks "would have" finished him if he didn't gas. Yikes.

 

The real reason people don't talk much about Mirko winning the OWGP via eye gouge these days is that most people haven't seen the fight and those that did don't post here any more... for the most part.

It's kinda crazy Cro Cop went from the OWGP champ and wrecking machine to getting wrecked himself by Gonzaga in less than a year.

 

you argue like a woman, some one says something less than positive about your favourite heartthrob and your break down in tears

anyone that knows anything about JMMA knows that Barnett's record is a little overated

 

Errr... no. You just said a lot of very stupid things which indicated to me that you have no idea what you're talking about and you're also not very smart, so there's no point in having a discussion with you.

 

Cro Cop was GOATed

 

2020, and still today, Pride 2006 is more bigger topic than any other organization final ever.

 

His style didn't translate very well to the cage since he couldn't corner people. Later on, when he changed his style to using elbows he did much better. I loved the OWGP but he was a bit overrated for it. He only beat 1 fulltime HW during the tournament and it was by eyepoke (though he would have won anyway). Plus Fedor wasn't in it. All that said the OWGP was awesome and they should do one again.

 

Easy to say that in hindsight after seeing how everything played out. Even before winning, he was already a top HW and very highly regarded. It was an open-weight tournament. He fought who was in front of him. Minowa fought giants all the time, beat a lot of them, and was used to it. Not saying it's a great win to beat Minowa as a HW, just stating facts. Yoshida mostly fought HWs throughout his career and has wins over legit HWs such as Don Frye, Mark Hunt and Satoshi Ishii. Wanderlei was heavier than him in their fight. He was beating Barnett up badly and beat him in the past anyway. While your full-time HW statement isn't false technically, context is important to consider. Also, Fedor was in the tournament initially but he dropped out because of an injury.

Most of these things aren't Cro Cop's fault. The eye poke was but it was an accident and it happens. Barnett tapped immediately which is also an odd response to an eye poke... he said he couldn't see and didn't wanna get punched while he couldn't see, which makes sense, but who taps to an eye poke... not blaming him in the slightest, but the reality is he was getting destroyed. I'm sure that fact influenced his decision in the moment as well. I'm just saying. Perhaps that was why Barnett was 100% humble in defeat and gave full credit to Cro Cop.

Just bugs me when people try to discredit the win, even though your post was fairly wholesome besides that.