Pride Wand vs Pride Little Nog

[Deleted member 110072]

You should rewatch that fight. What you're describing is WAY off. Cro Cop landed six or seven body kicks in that fight, resulting in his toe prints being imprinted on Wand's right side. Only after one body kick attempt in the second round (Cro Cop landed a hard body kick but then tried another one like 20 seconds later and Wand was ready for it) did Wand land a TD. He tried to catch the first kick that Cro Cop landed in the first round, but he wasn't fast enough, and after all the rest, he threw nothing, much less landed anything as counters. In all five rounds, I only recall Wand landing one punch, when he had Cro Cop against the ropes and Cro Cop tried to throw an inside low kick while Wand was coming in with a straight right and Wand landed a glancing punch. It's crazy enough that Wand just ate those kicks and kept coming, but he most certainly wasn't effectively countering them. What Wand was able to do effectively was swarm Cro Cop with flurries against the ropes to make him have to respect Wand's striking while also landing TDs to make him worry about Wand's grappling. In short, Wand fought an MMA fight against a kickboxer and won. Whereas in their second fight, it was two mixed martial artists fighting each other and the better one won by a landslide because he was no longer fighting at a massive disadvantage.

He put on 10 pounds. Wand was 215 in the first fight against Cro Cop and he was 225 in the second. He was also 218 against Fujita and was still his same old buzzsawing self. Again, it's not that Wand got remarkably slower, it's that Cro Cop was that much faster and he made Wand look like he was moving in slow motion.

To be fair I thin the extra weight and a lot more milage(especially after Rampage 2 and Hunt fights) did maybe slow Wand down a bit but he certainly wasnt THAT slow.

I would say as well it wasnt just that Mirko's grappling was better either but that his striking was also more MMA adapted, specifically he was more ready to throw counters more often and more ready to use a lot of lateral movement to deal with MMA fighters trying to rush him down more, he made sure Wand couldn't get him in the corner.. Grappling wise as well it wasnt just better defence but I think a significant part of the fight is Mirko unloading some big GnP on Wand when he reverses a takedown attempt.

 

[Bullitt68]

To be fair I thin the extra weight and a lot more milage(especially after Rampage 2 and Hunt fights) did maybe slow Wand down a bit but he certainly wasnt THAT slow.

I would say as well it wasnt just that Mirko's grappling was better either but that his striking was also more MMA adapted, specifically he was more ready to throw counters more often and more ready to use a lot of lateral movement to deal with MMA fighters trying to rush him down more, he made sure Wand couldn't get him in the corner.. Grappling wise as well it wasnt just better defence but I think a significant part of the fight is Mirko unloading some big GnP on Wand when he reverses a takedown attempt.

We agree 100% on Mirko's improvements as a mixed martial artist. Everything about his game was different and better, hence the very different outcome of the second fight.

But I don't agree on Wand slowing down. Go back to that Fujita fight. At 218 pounds, look at his quickness off of his back...



...and then at the end of the 10 minute opening round Wand opens up a vintage can of Axe Murderer whoop ass and beats Fujita pillar to post. He still had that toughness and durability, he still had that Energizer Bunny gas tank to savagely beat people with, and he still had scary speed in those death-dealing hooks. Wand was still Wand if you ask me, he was just fighting Cro Cop 2.0. But that's why the OWGP is such a special event: It was the first time that we saw an indication of how good Werdum would be, it was the best that Barnett ever looked, it was the best that Aleks looked, it was the best that Cro Cop looked, and it was the last time that Wand was Wand.

If we want to break things down microscopically, then I'll grant you that Wand's physical prime seemed to be 2003-2004, from the MWGP to PRIDE 28. He wasn't that version of himself anymore by 2006. But if we're going by that metric, then Cro Cop's physical prime was 2002-2003, when he put on the kickboxing clinic against K-1 champ Mark Hunt and made Igor, Herring, and Nog (for the first round) look like amateurs, all while very lean but still muscular and powerful with terrifying speed and fantastic conditioning. He also wasn't that version of himself anymore by 2006. (Remember, Cro Cop had a chipped bone in his foot and a badly deviated septum, so he waited until Final Conflict to throw his left kick and he had to breathe out of his mouth. He'd soon after get surgery on both his foot and his nose. Not exactly the picture of physical perfection.) Cro Cop had just improved his game so much, plus psychologically he was committed to winning the OWGP or retiring and you could see it in his face and the way he moved how he was in Kill or Be Killed mode.

There was a lot that played into how that night went. Wand being slow isn't part of it.

 

[Deleted member 110072]

We agree 100% on Mirko's improvements as a mixed martial artist. Everything about his game was different and better, hence the very different outcome of the second fight.

But I don't agree on Wand slowing down. Go back to that Fujita fight. At 218 pounds, look at his quickness off of his back...



...and then at the end of the 10 minute opening round Wand opens up a vintage can of Axe Murderer whoop ass and beats Fujita pillar to post. He still had that toughness and durability, he still had that Energizer Bunny gas tank to savagely beat people with, and he still had scary speed in those death-dealing hooks. Wand was still Wand if you ask me, he was just fighting Cro Cop 2.0. But that's why the OWGP is such a special event: It was the first time that we saw an indication of how good Werdum would be, it was the best that Barnett ever looked, it was the best that Aleks looked, it was the best that Cro Cop looked, and it was the last time that Wand was Wand.

If we want to break things down microscopically, then I'll grant you that Wand's physical prime seemed to be 2003-2004, from the MWGP to PRIDE 28. He wasn't that version of himself anymore by 2006. But if we're going by that metric, then Cro Cop's physical prime was 2002-2003, when he put on the kickboxing clinic against K-1 champ Mark Hunt and made Igor, Herring, and Nog (for the first round) look like amateurs, all while very lean but still muscular and powerful with terrifying speed and fantastic conditioning. He also wasn't that version of himself anymore by 2006. (Remember, Cro Cop had a chipped bone in his foot and a badly deviated septum, so he waited until Final Conflict to throw his left kick and he had to breathe out of his mouth. He'd soon after get surgery on both his foot and his nose. Not exactly the picture of physical perfection.) Cro Cop had just improved his game so much, plus psychologically he was committed to winning the OWGP or retiring and you could see it in his face and the way he moved how he was in Kill or Be Killed mode.

There was a lot that played into how that night went. Wand being slow isn't part of it.

I think before the Mirko loss it was really more a case of Wand maybe being slightly off peak but still not THAT far off peak, post Crocop KO though there was clearly a big dropoff.

If say the Wand who beat Rampage twice was 10/10 then this was more 9/10 but afterwards he was really never more than about 7/10 at best.

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

The biggest issue for Wanderlei in the rematch with Cro Cop was he lost his speed advantage by putting on so much muscle. He didn't fight him as tactically either but he didn't seem to know what to do when he couldn't outspeed him like he could in the first fight.

Cro Cop improved by leaps and bounds - that was the real reason Wand had no success in that second match.