Not sure if I'd agree with you TS, if I remember he's pretty small for a HW, got destroyed by Fedor & beaten soundly by Crocop. Other Sherdoggers are cricitcising those latter 2 fighters as being washed-up so where does that put Ishii?
Stylistically I'd like to see him match-up with Mir but I think he'd get ragdolled. Having said that, I haven't seen his recent fights... what makes you think he has the ability to beat the UFC's top HW's?
He is a 240 pound judo gold medalist with many MMA wins. I don't see him getting raggdolled by anybody.
Fedor was a beast after Hendo KOed him.
He was past his prime, but had the right approach and of course he won.
CC has allways been hard to take down and he obviously recovered a good deal mentally. He beat Gonzaga too and Ishiii gave him more trouble than Gonzaga.
CC, who looked better than in the UFC (more relaxed and more agressive) beat Ishii by a cut by and elbow from bellow and by head kick KO, but Ishii gave him a fight 2x, before that happened.
Oh BTW Ishii beat Sylvia, who weighed 140 kg, but looked good and moved well.
Say what you will about Sylvia, but he was definitely an UFC caliber fighter in 2012.
He beat DeFries who was 2-3 in the UFC.
Ishii is defininitely good enough for UFC.