The Future of Fighting Blog

Many an MMA underdog boldly promises to “shock the world” by besting his or her heavily favored opponent.

Most wind up shocked themselves, knocked flat on their backs or tapping out before they black out care of, say, a deeply sunk rear-naked choke.

A few, such as Rashad Evans and Matt Serra, actually make good on their brash predictions with devastating Rocky-like victories over, respectively, Chuck Liddell and Georges St. Pierre.

Now comes Patrick “The Predator” Cote (13-4-0), the latest underdog — actually, make that huge underdog — to promise to “shock the world” by beating UFC middleweight champion Anderson “The Spider” Silva (22-4-0), the dangerously explosive muay Thai striker considered by many to be the best pound-for-pound MMA fighter on the planet.

The two meet Saturday in a championship bout at UFC 90 in Rosemont, Ill.

“I’m very excited for this fight and I know there are a lot of people who are behind me and there are a lot of people who don’t think that I have a chance,” the heavy-handed Cote, 28, a KO artist in his own right, said in his thick French-Canadian accent.

“Anderson Silva is an incredible fighter. But nobody is unbeatable. He has been beat before and that can happen again. We found some little holes in his game that we’re going to exploit, and we know how to beat him. So I’m going in there and I’m going to do my stuff and shock the world.

“All my friends will put money on me, so they will be a lot richer after the fight,” he added with a laugh.

One of Cote’s two main trainers, the much-in-demand muay Thai specialist Mark DellaGrotte, conceded that the Brazilian Silva, 33, has few weaknesses.

“But there are some,” DellaGrotte said. “I think Anderson knows that he has weaknesses. And we’ve been looking. He has losses on his record and we’re looking to add to that with all due respect.”

Pressed to name one of the holes in Silva’s all-but flawless game, DellaGrotte said, “His chin doesn’t tuck as much as it should and it hasn’t been tested, you know? Nobody’s ever hit Anderson clean cause he can move well.”

Jeff Sherwood/Sherdog.com

Cote said that not only is his underdog status a big motivator, but so is the fact that the Silva bout, his first-ever UFC title shot, is the biggest fight of his career.

“For sure. You know I do this sport to be No. 1. I just don’t want to go there and fight and give a good show for the crowd. I want to do that. But I want to win too and be world champion,” said Cote, who has held belts earlier in his career in smaller Canadian MMA promotions such as TKO, Maximum Fighting Championships and King of the Cage Canada.

DellaGrotte said that while Cote is always motivated for fights, “Patrick is really motivated for this fight. This is his biggest test and I think he realizes that.

“As far as pressure goes, he’s one of the few fighters who handles pressure really, really well. Anderson’s mental game has played a huge role on his past opponents. He’s very strong mentally and seems to out-will everybody else, even before the fight. But Patrick is not the type that gets shaken up quick. He knows what he’s in for. But he knows (Silva is) a man. He knows he’s beatable.”

And thus Cote’s heavy underdog status (some oddsmakers have Silva –800, Cote +550) “pisses him off, to tell you the truth. That’s one thing he’s been saying all the time, ‘Man, everybody thinks this guy is going to beat me. ‘Man, I’m going to Matt Serra him,’” said the Boston-accented DellaGrotte in an imitation of Cote that was executed in a spot-on French-Canadian accent.

Cote said his heavy training for the fight — at Dellagrotte’s Sityodtong USA in Somerville, Mass., outside Boston; Fabio Holanda’s Brazilian Top Team Canada in Montreal; Howard Grant’s Boxing Gym, also in Montreal; and with the Canadian National Wrestling Team — is already over so as to give his body time to recuperate and be in peak condition for the fight.

“Right now, my big training, all the crazy stuff, is already done,” Cote said. “I’m in really good shape. I’m faster, leaner and stronger than I have ever been before. I’m just anxious for the fight. I can’t wait now.”

DellaGrotte said Cote is in the “cruise control” phase of his training now.

“He’s got cardio for days,” he said. “He’s implementing all types of different aspects of his game: punching, grappling, striking. Everything’s coming together really, really well for him. He’s never looked better.”

As for his game plan, Cote noted that his standup banging style is no secret.

“I think (Silva) will try to prove to everybody that he can knock me out, but that’s not gonna happen,” Cote said. “We have a really, really, really good game plan and great strategy for this fight. But I’m gonna keep a little part of that to myself.”

DellaGrotte shed a little more light, saying Cote isn’t planning to make the fight a highly technical muay Thai bout.

“Because that is what Anderson does,” he said. “You’ve got to make it an ugly fight. The game plan is just to go for it. (Silva’s) good everywhere and we know that. The guy’s a superstar. He’s a stud. So making a game plan for a guy like that involves everything.

“Cote’s not going to be as conservative as you’ve seen him in some of his last fights. I think he has a kitchen sink in his back pocket that he wants to throw during the fight,” DellaGrotte added with a laugh.

So, considering that Cote has never been knocked out but has been submitted twice (by Joe Doerksen and Travis Lutter), is it a safe assumption that he wants to keep the fight standing up?

Not necessarily.

“I’ve improved a lot of my defense on the ground, and my ground-and-pound game is very, very good right now, so wherever the fight will go, I’ll fight,” Cote said. “I train for everything and if I go on the ground, I’m very comfortable there.”

Cote said his No. 1 strength is his mind.

“Even with a rough start in the UFC, I’ve always believed in myself and I came back strong and right now I have a UFC title fight,” said Cote, who had lost his first four UFC bouts starting in 2004, the year he became a full-time fighter upon leaving the Canadian Army. “And the other thing is, I’m not intimidated by Anderson Silva. I respect him a lot, but you know, he’s a man made out of flesh and bone like me, so I ain’t scared of him at all.

“I just have to execute our game plan the day of the fight. It’s going to be a very hard fight, but we’re very confident that we are going to win. I will knock him out. He’s the best fighter in the world, so it’s going to be very good to be world champion and to have a win against the best fighter in the world at the same time.”

Chris Leben sat in a Clackamas County jail in northwestern Oregon for three weeks and pondered his past, present and future. Arrested on a probation violation related to a previous DUI conviction, Leben forfeited his chance to fight Michael Bisping at UFC 85 in June. As bad career moves go, few could have been worse.

“Obviously, things came up,” Leben says. “It was a huge letdown.”

Fortunately for the 28-year-old middleweight, UFC officials were in a forgiving mood. Given a reprieve by matchmakers, Leben (18-4) will challenge the once-beaten Bisping in the featured bout at UFC 89 this Saturday at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham, England.

“This is a huge opportunity for me,” Leben says. “Luckily, the UFC came back around and offered the fight again. It lit a fire underneath me. When I got a second chance, it made me that much more focused. I love the matchup. It’s the fight I wanted.”

His stint in a Pacific Northwest slammer aside, Leben has undergone a dramatic transformation since he appeared on season one of “The Ultimate Fighter” reality series. Gone seem the wild child days in which he found pleasure in breaking down doors and baptizing beds with urine. They were replaced by an eloquence and maturity spawned by genuine personal growth.

Leben’s metamorphosis was triggered by his embarrassing 49-second knockout loss to reigning UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva in 2006. Brash antics were traded for respectful undertones. In recent days, new pictures of Leben have emerged, revealing how renewed dedication to training has altered his physical appearance. Ripped lean muscle has chipped away at his once pudgy exterior.

Photo by Sherdog.com

“This is a huge opportunity
for me,” said Leben of a
shot at Michael Bisping.

“He’s in really good shape,” says T.J. Thompson, whom Leben works under as the MMA instructor at the Icon Fitness gym in Hawaii. “It will be interesting to see what people say after all the interviews and the weigh-ins. He looks a lot different.”

A headliner on a significant UFC card for the first time in his career, Leben went to great lengths to prepare for Bisping and even brought former Sportfight champion and longtime Team Quest associate Chris Wilson to Hawaii. An accurate striker with quick hands, Wilson mimicked the British middleweight as a key part of Leben’s training camp.

“He’s got some height, and he’s a little better at striking than Michael,” says Leben, who also spent time honing his skills under MMA trainer extraordinaire Matt Hume in Seattle. “Training’s gone phenomenal. I started the camp a little early.”

Leben needs every edge. Bisping (16-1) has looked nearly unstoppable since he made the move to middleweight earlier this year. He annihilated American Top Team’s Charles McCarthy at UFC 83 in April and then carved through Canadian veteran Jason Day seven weeks later at UFC 85. A split-decision loss to top light heavyweight contender Rashad Evans remains the lone blemish on Bisping’s resume.

Still, Leben believes the Brit may fold under consistent pressure.

“It’s easy for him to look good if you don’t press the fight against him,” he says. “I’m going to go out and press him the entire time. I know I’m in the best shape I’ve ever been in. Hopefully, that will play a factor in the fight.”

Leben expects a rude welcome from what promises to be a pro-Bisping crowd in Birmingham, though he shrugs off the idea that he will enter the cage as an underdog. Since back-to-back losses to Jason MacDonald and Kalib Starnes, Leben has rattled off consecutive victories against Terry Martin and Alessio Sakara, finishing both in spectacular fashion. He has momentum in his corner, too.

“I know that he’s going to have a few more fans in the building,” Leben says. “On paper, I don’t see myself as the underdog. You look at Bisping’s record and you look at my record; it’s a solid fight.”

Leben relishes the idea of being cast as the villain again.

“It doesn’t matter if they love you or hate you, as long as they care one way or another,” he says. “I like being the bad guy.”

Only one man — the incomparable Silva — has stopped Leben on strikes. Such durability could serve the American well against Bisping, who relies heavily on his hands and feet to win fights. In fact, 12 of his 16 victories have come by knockout, technical knockout or strike-induced submission.

“The guy can take a good punch,” Bisping says. “We’ve all seen it. Chris is tough. He’s not easy to put away.”

Much will be at stake when Leben and Bisping finally face one another. In a top-heavy division still thin on legitimate championship contenders, a convincing win could vault either of them into immediate title contention.

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again,” Leben says. “This fight’s going to be a deciding factor in who moves into the top tier in the middleweight division and who’s going to be in line for a title shot.”

Leben wants nothing more than another shot at Silva, the Brazilian who buried him under a violent volley of punches, kicks and knees two years ago in Las Vegas. He claims to have learned from his mistakes.

“I’m a much different fighter now,” Leben says. “The Chris Leben of today wouldn’t do what I did then.”

In a rather disturbing exercise in morbidity, Harris Interactive polled 1,017 Americans via telephone in 2004 and asked if they’d watch a televised execution. Two-thirds said that they would.

This has to be encouraging news for ProElite and CBS, who happen to be scheduling one this Saturday.

Sticking his neck in the guillotine is Ken Shamrock, a 44-year-old pug with a lifetime of knowledge and a body that no longer knows how to apply it.

Years spent in Pancrase, freestyle fighting and professional wrestling have left him a hobbled and creaky parody of a once-dangerous fighter. In his last five bouts, Shamrock has been knocked out or cerebrally stunned in the very first round. Aside from a victory over Kimo Leopoldo in 2004, he’s dropped seven of his last eight. (And if you’re Kimo, you can’t be feeling too good about that.)

Despite clear evidence that Shamrock is no longer physically capable of absorbing the nominal punishment of a prizefight — and it couldn’t be more obvious if he were wearing a medical alert bracelet — the sadists at Pro Elite have determined that fans are going to enjoy watching Internet-bred street fighter Kimbo Slice swing the axe.

Propagandists will tell you Shamrock’s submission acumen will be a good test for Slice, that his years of experience will threaten to topple the barely professional status of the reformed backyard brawler.

Reality check: Shamrock has one submission win in 12 years — over a man who currently has 20 losses against 7 wins on record. The vast majority of his ligament attacks came in Pancrase, where opponents wore massive leather boots that kept limbs free of sweat. Observers cannot recall the last time he even tried tackling an opponent, a probable result of decaying agility and stilted muscle activation.

Jim Page/Sherdog.com

Ken Shamrock (above), has won just
two bouts in his last 10 contests.

If we establish that Shamrock cannot tackle Slice, and if we also accept that submission defense is a relatively substantial part of Slice’s tutelage under Bas Rutten, then we’re left with a stand-up fight — one in which Slice will swing ferociously, backed by 240 pounds of muscle to Shamrock’s (estimated) 215.

Considering that a 185-pound Kazushi Sakuraba knocked Shamrock into the ropes, this is not exactly a bid for suspense on the level of Hitchcock.

Those of us repulsed by the idea — a likely minority — probably have Mike Tyson to thank. The violent mauler practically invented a new sub-genre of boxing in the 1980s when people would cheerfully pay $50 to watch him decimate an outclassed opponent.

“Sport” implies competition; these were slaughters. We watched it anyway. There’s undeniable appeal in seeing someone get obliterated, thrashed at the hands of a more competent fighter. Action heroes, after all, rarely oppose their equal in movies; they dispose of henchmen as quickly and efficiently as you would a dirty diaper.

But by and large, MMA has avoided this kind of lopsided violence. For all its perceived faults, the Ultimate Fighting Championship has made a habit of booking competitive and evenly matched fights. (Anderson Silva might be better than everyone he’s faced, but you can’t say slotting in Dan Henderson or Rich Franklin was premeditated cruelty.)

Bereft of substantial talent pools or matchmaking acumen, it’s the peripheral organizations that are beginning to trot out these kinds of depressing spectacles. Slice himself already had a turn against David “Tank” Abbott, who is as relevant to modern MMA as Jalopies are to Detroit, and Dream’s insistence on having Kazushi Sakuraba face Melvin Manhoef should’ve been criminally investigated.

There are ways of bringing along Slice without resorting to physically bankrupt competition. James Thompson was a good start, a big, athletic and experienced man who pushed Slice and arguably made him a better fighter for it. Why go backward with Shamrock? Why not once-rumored opponent Ron Waterman, another credible threat? Waterman could conceivably work Slice over on the mat, sure, but it’s also possible his underwhelming stand-up would fold under Slice’s attack.

In other words, there’s actually an element of doubt and debate over who would win the fight. And isn’t that the whole point?

Elite could argue such possibilities suffer from media apathy thanks to athletes who have yet to cultivate any kind of engaging presence. It’s an empty retort, as the Thompson fight drew big ratings for the company — and if you can’t make something out of Waterman’s fervent religious beliefs, you’re not trying hard enough.

Shamrock’s adrenal glands, depleted at fight time, seem to come alive for the media, and his circus-barker intensity in front of a camera is a likely reason why he continues getting opportunities. But have we really reached the point where prefight banter is valued more than a fighter’s aptitude in the ring?

Shamrock has been quoted as saying he’s not concerned about his “legacy,” or how people perceive his contributions to the sport when they’ve been topped off by a string of bad performances. And he shouldn’t be: Elite and the Florida Athletic Commission should do that worrying for him, both over their endorsement of a man with seven proven years of eroding skills and their delight in making him grist for Slice’s mill.

One addendum: Of those polled by Harris, 21 percent said they’d pay to see the execution. Looks like Elite missed out on some solid pay-per-view revenue.

For comments, e-mail jrossen@sherdog.com