Issue 177

April 2019

The heavyweight hero is faded and we need to let him go before he suffers some irreparable damage

Fedor Emelianenko keeps fighting and the romantic in us just wants something that was there in the past to rise up in him. With that berserker Sambo style of his, Fedor was incomparable in a stretch of 27 successful fights from December 2000 until June 2010. He beat everyone who was anyone. Never had a bad word to say about his opponents. Never gloated. Never glowed even. There are few who do not admire the great Russian bear.

So much so that we accept the faded version of the GOAT of heavyweight fighters walking to the cage for his fights. I've just done so, observing him in fight week in Los Angeles. He remains fascinating. But witnessing Fedor fight live at The Forum against Ryan Bader in the final of the Bellator heavyweight grand prix in January was just that moment, urging him to draw something from his great, deep well. But we should tell the truth. The well is dry, and Fedor is now into the dispiriting winter of his career. 

We should not encourage him to go on, as we did with Muhammad Ali, and others. The fight world is unforgiving, and more than that the signs are there. His teams say Fedor's sambo style 'still works', but the body creaks in camp, and indeed after fights. 

I happened to be thumbing through a listicle which popped up online a few days ago, 'Fighters who should have stopped earlier', or something to that effect, and in the top 20 were Dan Severn, Gary Goodridge, Mark Kerr, Mark Coleman, Jens Pulver, Matt Hughes, Chuck Liddell, and Fedor. Checking the date on the article – it was from January 2012. It was a reminder. He has gone on too long. Far too long. 

Fedor, and Chuck, of course, have both fought in the last few months. Chuck had his third fight with Tito Ortiz, 14 years after their second fight, also at The Forum late in November last year, an MMA event put together by boxing outfit, Golden Boy Promotions. There was heavy criticism from large swathes of the MMA media, with fans not having seen Liddell – once undoubtedly 'The Man' in MMA – in a cage for eight years. What transpired was certainly a far cry from the fighter who once epitomized 'sprawl and brawl'. Or, more to the point, the on point brawler Liddell who knocked Ortiz out in 2004 and then again in 2006. Liddell was horribly knocked out this time around, and looked a shadow of himself.

Back at Bellator, Bader knocked Fedor down with a lunging left hook from distance, felling him, and finished up with a right hand. It took 35 seconds. Taking nothing away from Bader, or the Fedor who beat Frank Mir and Chael Sonnen in that tournament, but we must safeguard the health of our heroes. And not expose them. There was a flatness, a sadness, after Bellator 214. I was not alone in feeling it. It was a collectively felt sense in that arena.    

Gary Goodridge was in that article from 2012. He came back again, and again. He'd fight anyone. He was Pride’s gatekeeper. Fedor, Alistair Overeem, Igor Vovchanchyn, Pedro Rizzo, Marco Ruas, Mark Coleman, Gilbert Yvel, Heath Herring, Don Frye. In all, there were 84 MMA and kickboxing challenges. Six years ago, associates were reporting that his speech, memory and co-ordination were deteriorating. He needed medication. Levoxyl for his thyroid. Cipralex for depression. Aricept for memory. A drug regimen once taken by Alzheimer’s patients. 

Cleveland Clinic studies on the effects on the brain in MMA fighters started six years ago, and we are due some research. My bet is that in ten years time, the evidence they will have found will mean that fighters like Fedor will be precluded from taking part in high level competition due to the complications that we know will arise. It will apply to the Chucks and the Garys. Science will have told us. The eye does not lie to fans who have watched hundreds, maybe thousands of fights. There is romance in the idea of Fedor doing a three-fight farewell tour – against lower level opposition – in New York, Tokyo and Moscow, but wouldn't it just be better for the great man to stop now, to become an ambassador for the sport, and an ultimate role model for another generation?