I will get flamed for this but flame on: I think Jacare's guard was highly overrated in MMA. He doesn't have a single submission from guard over an impressive opponent and as much as I hate Khamzat, I don't think Jacare is the "immediate threat" from guard that everyone always said he was. Go watch his fight against the lowly Francis Carmont and tell me he wouldn't get completely smashed with ground and pound against Khamzat.
Members of the online MMA community always had a raging hard-on with fighters who had "an active guard" (even if they had the absolute worst takedown defense like Condit) but it's not the early days of MMA when BJJ was some "secret weapon" lol... how often do you ever see a triangle or armbar end a fight in a high level fight anymore??
Werdum is one of the only fighters I can think of that was a constant threat if you were in his guard. Not only that, he had tremendous control and rarely took any damage if someone was on top (watch the Gonzaga rematch for this) which is something Jacare struggled with when strikes were involved.
Now, as someone posted above, Khamzat was afraid to go to the ground with an undersized Burns so maybe this would be a pure striking match in which case Jacare has a lot of power, good cardio, and a pretty solid chin to potentially carry him into the later "gas out" rounds but his ground game "advantage" is frequently overstated in MMA IMHO (as it is with many others now that BJJ defense is universally trained).
Would still be pulling for Jacare though 100% if they fought. His UFC career was such an utter disappointment considering how they wasted his time with so many cans. He should have been an immediate title contender but that was a messy time at MW
