Mousasi/Machida

After seeing Machida's flaws in his last fight and seeing that he is indeed beatable, and then seeing Mousasi's impressive performance last night. I found myself wondering in this situation...who would win?

Mousasi has a phenomenal ground game with his jiu jitsu, and has good muay thai in his standup.

We all know Machida's skill set and why he's so good.

Who wins in your eyes...gimme the who, how, and why.


(I'll give my answer later, I gotta go to work)

Close to call but I guess Machida.

Machida big time! I like Gegard but he's not ready, he had trouble last night.

I've been saying this for a while now. Mousasi is the guy who's going to beat Machida & Anderson.

Mousasi pretty much dominated that fight lol idk what you were watching. The only time that soukodju or however you spell it did anything was a counter toss, and one time he managed to roll out from under Mousasi.

I was extremely impressed with Mousasi last night.

That whole card was amazing IMO. It was some of the best all around fights ive seen on a card recently, and definately had the best showing of jiu jitsu that i think I have EVER seen on a single card.

Before I sway too far off topic, I think Mousasi has a very legitimate chance of knocking off Machida, if they ever do face off.

Mousasi would lose to either Shogun or Machida. Rameau looked like he wanted no part of Mousasi yet he actually did really well. He took him down at will and landed combinations just fine. He's a great talent no doubt, but Rameau isn't even close to top ten anymore -- Mousasi was far more impressive against Sobral.

Shogun nor Machida would toss Mousasi around like that because neither are world class like judo like Soko.

Yeah, I think this is a matchup issue. I think Gegard could be the p4p best fighter in the world in a few years, but right now he's probably ONLY better than pretty much every LHW. I could see him beating Shogun and Machida, but I could also see him losing to either of those two. I'd put him at 3 right now because Machida and Shogun have fought the better competition overall. But Gegard is very well rounded, and his boxing is pretty much top notch for MMA. Hope he gets a chance to fight those guys soon.

ChaoscamelWV wrote:

Yeah, I think this is a matchup issue. I think Gegard could be the p4p best fighter in the world in a few years, but right now he's probably ONLY better than pretty much every LHW. I could see him beating Shogun and Machida, but I could also see him losing to either of those two. I'd put him at 3 right now because Machida and Shogun have fought the better competition overall. But Gegard is very well rounded, and his boxing is pretty much top notch for MMA. Hope he gets a chance to fight those guys soon.

Mousasi took on a ton of the best non UFC MWs in the Dream GP. Since then he's faced Hunt, Babalu, & Soko. It doesn't get much better than that for non UFC LHWs. Basically Mousasi's only chance to prove he's the best is to join the UFC. I mean maybe every once in a while someone will defect like Hendo and I guess King Mo is out there, but the competition at his weight class is in the UFC.

Mousasi is weak to greco/judo fighters but Machida doesn't employ that, so it's hard to say. Machida won't fall for a Shogun gameplan again so we'd have to go with him by default.

Machida's clinch work is killer. It's not Sokoudjou's, but it is way better than Mousasi's. Watch his fights with Sokoudjou and Ortiz, then see that he train with Satoshi Ishii. His Judo or grappling is really high level stuff, but he only seems to use it for the purposes of controlling where the fight goes and he likes to stand.

Mousasi said some of the stuff he did in training for the fight messed him up, and he said he did not train for this one like he usually does as in he tried new things that did not work for him and was overall "not impressed by his performace".

I was happy to see Sok use his Judo though, but the second round seems to always kill him.

He continues to have no answers for being off his back. His cardio seemed better and he threw good combinations, my gosh were his takedowns killer. He could grind out wins the way Gleison Tibau did against Josh Neer by just continuously whipping guys to the ground, then letting them back up.

I've been on the same page as Farmer for a long while on this issue. I think Mousasi is the kryptonite for both Machida and Anderson. I really wanted to see the latter before Mousasi decided to move up! Those of you that weren't impressed by his fight Saturday are a little slow on the uptake. This "KID" is for real. All of that talent at 24 years old...

KingsOwn19 wrote:

Mousasi said some of the stuff he did in training for the fight messed him up, and he said he did not train for this one like he usually does as in he tried new things that did not work for him and was overall "not impressed by his performace".

I was happy to see Sok use his Judo though, but the second round seems to always kill him.

That's because he looked like he was on a steady diet of crack and red bull.

LikesToFightGuy wrote:

I've been on the same page as Farmer for a long while on this issue. I think Mousasi is the kryptonite for both Machida and Anderson. I really wanted to see the latter before Mousasi decided to move up! Those of you that weren't impressed by his fight Saturday are a little slow on the uptake. This "KID" is for real. All of that talent at 24 years old...

Yea, I'm not really getting the criticism... That was the first time I have seen Mousasi fight and I was very impressed. I loved how he was so calm and cool the entire fight. He made a new fan Saturday night.

KmacLamb23 wrote:

LikesToFightGuy wrote:

I've been on the same page as Farmer for a long while on this issue. I think Mousasi is the kryptonite for both Machida and Anderson. I really wanted to see the latter before Mousasi decided to move up! Those of you that weren't impressed by his fight Saturday are a little slow on the uptake. This "KID" is for real. All of that talent at 24 years old...

Yea, I'm not really getting the criticism... That was the first time I have seen Mousasi fight and I was very impressed. I loved how he was so calm and cool the entire fight. He made a new fan Saturday night.

Same here. That was my first time seeing alot of those guys fight.

Mousasi definately earned a spot as one of my new favorite fighters though. His jiu jitsu skill is amazing.

NoRegret go youtube dream MW GP.

Mousasi had some entertaining fights vs Jacare, Manhoef, & Kang.

Oh and if anyone is wondering just how big Mousasi is, here is a pic with him next to Fedor.

Remember, since losing a fight that he was dominating against Gono 3½ years ago (Making a dumb mistake leaving the arm dangling), Mousasi has won 14 straight including knocking off a pretty impressive list of guys like Lombard, Cyborg, Kang, Manhoef, Jacare, Hunt, Babalu and Soko... The guy has only 2 decisions in his career and just finishes fights, either by impressive striking or almost as impressive submission skill. There's nothing to not like about him as he's exciting to watch and has a ton of talent...

LikesToFightGuy wrote:

Remember, since losing a fight that he was dominating against Gono 3½ years ago (Making a dumb mistake leaving the arm dangling), Mousasi has won 14 straight including knocking off a pretty impressive list of guys like Lombard, Cyborg, Kang, Manhoef, Jacare, Hunt, Babalu and Soko... The guy has only 2 decisions in his career and just finishes fights, either by impressive striking or almost as impressive submission skill. There's nothing to not like about him as he's exciting to watch and has a ton of talent...

+1

No horn tooting here, but I think it is ironic I have argued heatedly MMA with guys who are just now seeing fighters I've been watching for years.

Mousasi is a lot smaller than Fedor - watch their exibition from an M-1 event a couple months ago- in that fight which was a semi work in all likelyhood, Fedor judo tossed Mousasi like he was literally nothing. Now I know losing the judo battle to Soko and Fedor is something most MMA fighters would do considering they're the two best Judo fighters right now arguably, but again, this shows me that high level judo(and by default, greco) fighters are the type to beat Mousasi.

Dan Henderson, unless slowed by age, is the man to beat Mousasi. Mousasi has great striking, but Hendo has withstood shots from heavier hitters many times, packs a nice punch of his own, isn't likely to ever be sub'd, and has the exact wrestling style to defeat Gegard.

Hendo wins the LHW title in Strikeforce.

Wolfgangsta wrote:

No horn tooting here, but I think it is ironic I have argued heatedly MMA with guys who are just now seeing fighters I've been watching for years.

Mousasi is a lot smaller than Fedor - watch their exibition from an M-1 event a couple months ago- in that fight which was a semi work in all likelyhood, Fedor judo tossed Mousasi like he was literally nothing. Now I know losing the judo battle to Soko and Fedor is something most MMA fighters would do considering they're the two best Judo fighters right now arguably, but again, this shows me that high level judo(and by default, greco) fighters are the type to beat Mousasi.

Dan Henderson, unless slowed by age, is the man to beat Mousasi. Mousasi has great striking, but Hendo has withstood shots from heavier hitters many times, packs a nice punch of his own, isn't likely to ever be sub'd, and has the exact wrestling style to defeat Gegard.

Hendo wins the LHW title in Strikeforce.

And if SF had a clue, they would get Hendo signed and make the fight. I agree that Hendo's strengths would pose problems with Gegard... 3-5 years ago. Hendo would have to hope to eek out a decision today and Gegard's youth along with conditioning is much better than Hendo, especially at 205 in 2010. And I'm much more confident in Gegard submitting Hendo than I am Hendo KOing Gegard today. If Anderson can sink in a RNC, Gegard could get the submission. But I'm not sure of anyone KOing Hendo... EVER. That guy's not going down until the Reaper comes a knocking...

Hendo is a strange man. His chin has grown much stronger in recent years than it once was. The first Wanderlei fight, Hendo was on queer street big time and nearly stopped, and none other than Carlos Newton had Dan doing the chicken dance twice in their championship fight in the UFC 17 tournament.

Since then, other than the Anderson fight, where the knee led to the sub, I can't really fight an example of him being rocked off the top of my head.

(confession - never seen his Misaki fight - was he hurt in that?)

what the hell is going on here..

Soko pisses me off .. I mean what the hell does he do for training .. how can he not get his cardio up and work on a ground game .. Soko did not take any damage in the first round but he was exhausted before the 2nd round even started.. Oh, and soko won the first round btw...

GolbeZ wrote:

what the hell is going on here..

Soko pisses me off .. I mean what the hell does he do for training .. how can he not get his cardio up and work on a ground game .. Soko did not take any damage in the first round but he was exhausted before the 2nd round even started.. Oh, and soko won the first round btw...

I disagree. I dont think Soko did enough to be declared the winner of the 1st round. All he did was counter a takedown and roll out from under Mousasi one time.

He didnt inflict hardly any damage to Mousasi at all, where as Mousasi out-struck and out-grappled him both standing and on the ground throughout the whole fight.



IMO Soko is on steroids or something. There's no excuse for him to look like he's in that good of shape and then gas as quick as he did. He's got good power yes...but no durability. ROIDS! lol