UFC on Fuel 10 Post-Fight Stock Report

UFC on Fuel TV 10 delivered submission after submission. It broke the record for most submissions in a single UFC event with eight.In the main event, No. 3-ranked heavyweight Fabricio Werdum tapped Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira in the second round. A feat t…

UFC on Fuel TV 10 delivered submission after submission. It broke the record for most submissions in a single UFC event with eight.

In the main event, No. 3-ranked heavyweight Fabricio Werdum tapped Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira in the second round. A feat the first of its kind.

Eleven other bouts were in action. Brazilians had a very successful night against the foreign contingent that made the trip down. Saturday night was all about the home nation. The raucous crowd got to enjoy a night of domination from their local fighters.

This is the post-fight stock report for UFC on Fuel TV 10.

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UFC on Fuel 10 Weigh-In Results for Nogueira vs. Werdum Fight Card

The UFC will be back in Brazil on Saturday for UFC on Fuel 10, a fight card that will be headlined by a bout between two top-10 fighters in the heavyweight division, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and Fabricio Werdum.  The co-main event of the evening w…

The UFC will be back in Brazil on Saturday for UFC on Fuel 10, a fight card that will be headlined by a bout between two top-10 fighters in the heavyweight division, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and Fabricio Werdum.  The co-main event of the evening will see the finalists from the second season of The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil square off for the opportunity to earn a UFC contract.

Full UFC on Fuel 10 Weigh-In Results:

Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira (237) vs. Fabricio Werdum (242)

William Macario (170) vs. Leo Santos (170)

Rafael Cavalcante (204) vs. Thiago Silva (206)

Eddie Mendez (184) vs. Daniel Sarafian (186)

Jason High (170) vs. Erick Silva (170)

Rony Jason (146) vs. Mike Wilkinson (145)

Raphael Assuncao (135) vs. Vaughan Lee (134)

Felipe Arantes (146) vs. Godofredo Castro (146) 

Ildemar Alcantara (171) vs. Leandro Silva (169)

Rodrigo Damm (146) vs. Mizuto Hirota (146)

Caio Magalhaes (186) vs. Karlos Vemola (186)

Antonio Braga Neto (185) vs. Anthony Smith (184)

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Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira: Still Here After All These Years

When Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira won his first major title in PRIDE Fighting Championships while competing in Japan back in 2001, the roster of heavyweights over in America fighting in the UFC was a much different list than it is today. At that time, fut…

When Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira won his first major title in PRIDE Fighting Championships while competing in Japan back in 2001, the roster of heavyweights over in America fighting in the UFC was a much different list than it is today.

At that time, future UFC Hall of Famer Randy Couture was champion, and the list of contenders included Pedro Rizzo, Ricco Rodriguez and Josh Barnett.  A young future champion named Frank Mir was actually the opening fight on the card where Couture defeated Rizzo for a second straight time to retain his title back in 2001.

During that same period, Nogueira was ruling the heavyweight world in Japan as the new PRIDE champion after defeating Heath Herring.

Now more than 11 years later, Nogueira is still in the top 10 of the division and fighting in main events like the one coming up this weekend at UFC on Fuel 10, while most of the heavyweights that were relevant back in 2001 are long gone. 

“A lot of guys came in after me and they quit before me,” Nogueira told Bleacher Report.  “I’ve seen that a lot.  That’s motivation.  That’s teamwork, I don’t do that myself.  I’m hungry, but I have a good team around me. Good coaches and good sparring partners.  When you wake up in the morning and have good training and learn something, have good adrenaline and you’re going to face some good guys in the gym, that keeps you warm.  I keep good people around me to keep that motivation.”

Nogueira works on a daily basis with a murderer’s row of MMA talent, including former UFC heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos, UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva and a host of other top fighters from Brazil. 

The talent in the room helps to keep Nogueira feeling young, although he admits his body sometimes feels a little older, especially after a rough couple of years that saw him on the doctor’s table as much as he was on the mats.

A lifetime of fighting can catch up to a person’s body, and Nogueira found that out all too well with knee injuries, hip injuries and a broken arm suffered in his bout against Frank Mir in 2011. 

Now as he enters his next fight this weekend against Fabricio Werdum, Nogueira says he’s let his body heal up instead of pushing through injuries for once.  It’s resulted in the best condition his body has felt in years.

“Coming off of the last two or three years, I was coming off a lot of injuries.  My ACL, my hips and now I feel I’m in the best shape,” Nogueira stated.  “I couldn’t do my best performance in the last few years.  I’ve improved a lot of things.  I’ve improved a lot of my hands.  It’s given me motivation to fight the best.”

Nogueira will get a chance to prove he’s back to full health when he faces a top-three heavyweight this weekend in his native Brazil.  The former UFC and PRIDE champion is very familiar with Werdum because he actually fought him once before in 2007 when both were competing in Japan.

“I was a more experienced fighter than he was, I strike much better than him, and I used more of my experience.  But the biggest thing in the fight was I put him to fight my fight, that’s how the fight worked,” Nogueira said when remembering their first fight.  “He was dangerous a couple of times.  He was a new jiu-jitsu guy coming up in PRIDE with a lot of good submissions.  We worked a lot on how to avoid the submissions, the triangles and the armbars.  But my boxing was better, my timing was better, and I made him fight my game.  He was a tough opponent.”

Nogueira knows that a lot can change over the course of six years, but fundamentally, he believes there are still advantages he has over Werdum now the same as he did before.

The plan is to make Werdum fall into those same tendencies, and Nogueira believes he can walk away victorious.

“I know that’s going to give me an idea of what’s going to be in the next fight,” Nogueira said.  “My hands are better.  I’m going to try to make him fight my fight like we had before.”

Damon Martin is a Featured Columnist for Bleacher Report and all quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted.

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UFC Star Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira’s Career Timeline: Fedor, Frank Mir and More

Often overlooked, perhaps because he played second fiddle to the great Fedor Emelianenko for so long, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira remains on the short list of the best heavyweights of all time. As he prepares to hit the cage for what could be the final ti…

Often overlooked, perhaps because he played second fiddle to the great Fedor Emelianenko for so long, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira remains on the short list of the best heavyweights of all time. As he prepares to hit the cage for what could be the final time this weekend in his native Brazil, let’s journey back in time to hit the highs and the lows of what will surely go down as a Hall of Fame career.

 

January 2000

While Nogueira actually made his pro debut the previous year, it was this win over established star Jeremy Horn that caught the attention of hardcore fans globally. It was one thing to win a couple of fights in Japan’s Rings promotion, where the action was often fixed and the fighters were not always world class competitors.

But Jeremy Horn was the real thing, and beating him for Jamie Levine’s old World Extreme Fighting promotion meant Nogueira was a young fighter worth watching closely.

 

February 2001

After losing an awful decision to Dan Henderson the previous February, Nogueira got a second chance to win the Rings King of Kings tournament. This time he left nothing to chance, choking out Hiromitsu Kanehara in the semifinals and Valentijn Overeem in the finals to win the prestigious tournament that featured Horn, Randy Couture, Kiyoshi Tamura, Volk Han and Fedor Emelianenko among others.

 

September 2001

Nogueira beat Pride Heavyweight Grand Prix winner Mark Coleman with a triangle armbar in the first round. Before the fight, Nogueira told the Japanese press he was excited to join the big leagues of MMA:

It was my long wish to enter Pride. It is one of the best Vale Tudo competitions, and it is great to be able to fight with the best Vale Tudo warriors. Of those, Coleman, one of the best fighters, was chosen as my opponent. That is what I wanted. I am ready physically and mentally. I can fight with anybody. I have already studied Coleman’s fighting style. I am looking forward to fighting with him.

The dominant win catapulted the Brazilian jiu jitsu standout to the top of many pundit’s heavyweight top 10 lists.

 

August 2002

Before an injury to his orbital bone turned him into a laughingstock, former NFL and pro wrestling prospect Bob Sapp was one of the scariest men in the sport. More than 300 pounds of solid muscle with bad intentions, Sapp guaranteed a bad night for even the best fighters. Inexperienced, but in a good way that allowed him to ignore dangers that might have slowed smarter fighters, Sapp ran roughshod over professional kickboxing and MMA in Japan.

“I didn’t know anything about fighting. So I was confident I was going to win. The best way I could win is to do what I could do naturally. I just came from pro wrestling so I only knew mainly pro wrestling moves. So, you can see during the fight, I used it,” Sapp told me in a 2007 interview. Sapp tossed Nogueira around like the proverbial rag doll, once even “power-bombing” him right on his head, a pro wrestling move that Sapp had worked on with training partner Josh Barnett.

“Josh was like ‘Bob you don’t know anything about MMA so just do it. Man you can do that. You’re strong enough to do it. Do it and you’ll hit every highlight reel, I’ll tell you that much.’ I said ‘I’ll do it, whatever.’ What happens with kickboxing, what happens with MMA is that everyone follows a rule of thumb and gets used to doing the same stuff all the time. And there’s a million different moves in there that you can do. And nobody really wants to do them. But when you don’t know anything, you
can do everything and let your mind go crazy and utilize the essential parts of MMA. Use the basics and the rest is up to the individual.”

Nogueira was actually briefly unconscious after the Sapp slam. But he awoke long enough to tame the beast in one of the most legendary bouts in MMA history. The fight was one of three main events that drew a reported 91,107 to Tokyo’s National Stadium. Though that number is likely inflated, it remains the largest crowd ever to witness an MMA show live.

 

March 2003

Nogueira is outfoxed by rising Russian star Fedor Emelianenko, who beat him to the punch on the ground and on his feet to become the new Pride champion. Nogueira went into the fight with a serious back injury, an ailment he kept quiet until Sam Sheridan wrote about it for A Fighter’s Heart.

“For like two months I was not walking well,” Nogueira told Sheridan. “I was coming down in my shape, and he was in the best shape he’s ever been in.”

 

November 2003

More than 60,000 fans packed the Tokyo Dome to see Nogueira take on fearsome kickboxer Mirco “Cro Cop” Filopovic for the interim heavyweight title. Before the bout, Nogueira went to Wanderlei Silva, a fierce rival of his Brazilian Top Team teammates, for advice on how to survive the Croatian striker.

“I had thoroughly studied Mirko’s fights by watching the videos. Among those, it was Wanderlei who did the best fight,” Nogueira told Weekly Gong magazine.

“No matter how many times he got middle punches, Wanderlei never dropped his hands down from his guard for the head and kept on moving all the time. This became a clue for my fight to come. So when I met Wanderlei, I asked him ‘How was a Mirko’s body punch? Is it endurable?'”

Silva advised that you could survive Cro Cop’s body shots, but not his high kick to the head.  The right kick, famously, would send you to the hospital. The left? The cemetery.

Nogueira avoided those telling blows and eventually submitted the striker with a second-round armbar.

 

December 2004

After a rematch with Fedor Emelianenko was stopped early after a cut from an inadvertent headbutt, Nogueira finally got an opportunity to avenge his loss and reclaim his spot as the world’s best heavyweight.

Though he liked Fedor, the two were fierce rivals, pushing each other towards greatness.

“I’m much better than I was two years ago,” Rodrigo told Sheridan on the eve of the fight. “Before I had him, I felt like ‘I am going to train for what?'”

Nogueira’s plan in the return bout was to box with the champion, hoping his superior technique could prevail. Instead, Fedor‘s blinding speed told the tale. He battered Nogueira for 20 solid minutes, forever establishing his place as the top heavyweight of his era.

 

September 2006

In a career full of great fights, this barn burner with Josh Barnett stands out as one of the very best. It’s the end that people will remember, Nogueira screaming in pain as Barnett finally locked in a kneebar in the closing seconds.

But the action was furious throughout. From a Barnett left hook that dropped him to the mat early to a scintillating ground battle over a Nogueira armbar, it was the kind of fight that showed fans and skeptics how scientific and multi-faceted this sport could really be.

 

March 2007

Just months after the collapse of the beloved Pride Fighting Championships, Nogueira made his UFC debut against a familiar face. He and Heath Herring had gone to war back in 2001, a toe-to-toe battle that remains one of the best heavyweight MMA fights of all time. A 2004 rematch was nearly as good.

Would the third time be the charm for Herring, a consistent bridesmaid who couldn’t quite vault to the top of the sport? Frankly, the UFC expected that answer to be no. It was a fight that promised to be exciting and fun, but it was also a contest Nogueira was supposed to win en route to a heavyweight title shot.

Instead, Herring creamed Nogueira with a high kick in the first round, sending him plummeting to the mat. If he had followed up immediately with aggressive ground and pound, it might have been Herring on his way to a title shot. But he made the decision to step back and make the referee stand the former Pride champion up.

It was a decision that will haunt Herring until his final days, but not one I’d call inexplicable. Nogueira was dangerous off his back, even when hurt. Clearly that was in the back of Herring’s mind, the idea of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory an ever present danger. Jumping on a prone Nogueira is dangerous, even when he’s knocked silly. Ultimately, however, it was a risk worth taking.

Inevitably, Nogueira recovered from the powerful blow. Inevitably, he does just enough to win a unanimous decision. And, inevitably, Herring descended back to gatekeeper status, his one opportunity to seize destiny in both hands squandered by a faint heart.

 

February 2008

Nogueira again looked vulnerable, this time against the lumbering Tim Sylvia in a fight for the UFC interim heavyweight title. Sylvia dropped Big Nog with a left-right combo in the first and spent the better part of five minutes bludgeoning him.

Sylvia, using his size to keep Nogueira at bay standing and his bulk to avoid persistent takedowns, was in firm control in the third round. But it only takes one mistake against a submission artist like Nogueira, and when the chance came, he pounced, sweeping Sylvia and finishing the fight with a brutal guillotine choke.

A snapshot post fight would have been incredibly deceiving. Nogueira, the victor, was covered in blood. The only sign Sylvia had been in a fight was the haunted look in his eyes.

 

December 2008

Despite early success in the Octagon, Nogueira was mostly a stranger to UFC fans who hadn’t had the chance to see him at his best. He was a respected veteran—but not a star. Until, that is, The Ultimate Fighter propelled him into the limelight.

Nogueira and the cocky Frank Mir were excellent adversaries on reality television. The show made Mir, already the bad guy, a comic book level villain complete with long monologues espousing his own greatness and ever present sneer. By contrast, Nogueira looked like Mother Teresa.

Their eventual fight was highly anticipated, but ultimately disappointing. Nogueira never looked quite right and was knocked out in the second round. Eventually an injury surfaced.

“I hurt my left knee very bad.  I couldn’t get the right shape,” Nogueira told Fighter’s Only. “Everybody could see that I wasn’t a good fighter tonight.  I didn’t fight well.  I think I can fight much better than this.”  

 

August 2009

A pitched battle with fellow legend Randy Couture was Nogueira’s last great fight. And, nearly four years and countless contests later, it’s a bout that remains the best fight I’ve ever seen live.

The two aging warriors were able to hold off father time just long enough to put on a clinic in front of Couture’s rabid hometown crowd. The 15 minutes were filled to the bursting point with superb standing exchanges, grappling, submissions and escapes. This was mixed martial arts at its very best.

 

December 2011

Nogueira finally got his rematch with Mir—but things didn’t go any better. He was submitted for the first time in his career, though referee Herb Dean was actually in the process of stopping the fight before the tap actually came. The valiant Nogueira didn’t concede the fight until his arm was broken by a vicious Mir Kimura lock.

“I stopped it because I saw the arm break,” Dean told Sherdog. “The tap came after. I don’t stop it when I believe it’s locked on or even if I believe the guy’s in jeopardy because I don’t know what that person can take. I don’t know what their limits are, but if I see an injury that is too dangerous for the fight to continue, that’s when I’m going to stop the fight. Or if I see the fighter tap.”

 

October 2012

Nogueira made a triumphant return, defying critics and refusing to retire after Mir’s brutal submission snapped his arm. Dave Herman, the victim du jour, made the mistake of suggesting he was unsubmittable. A second-round armbar cured him of that delusion quickly.

 

June 8, 2013

Nogueira is once again being thrown to the wolves, this time against Fedor smasher Fabricio Werdum. Nogueira actually beat Werdum in 2006, before his steep decline, but he barely resembles the fighter who ruled the Pride heavyweight ranks, the crown prince to Fedor‘s king.

“We fought in 2006 and Nogueira was more experienced then and I got beat up in that fight,” Werdum told ESPN. “I’m much stronger now.”

After a season of reality television, the Brazilian crowd should be hot for this matchup, even if Nogueira has seen better days. Can the old warhorse, now 37, make one more run at the title? Or is he just a road block in the path of fighters like Werdum? This is a bout that should answer plenty of questions about Nogueira’s future—and just might be the last fight of his legendary career.

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UFC on Fuel 10 Video Preview: Rafael Cordeiro Breaks Down Nogueira vs. Werdum

The hot topic of the moment is who will step in to face Mauricio Rua in the co-main event of UFC 161. That drama is stealing some of the thunder from the fight card that is taking place this weekend, UFC on Fuel 10.  True, the June 8 card doesn&rs…

The hot topic of the moment is who will step in to face Mauricio Rua in the co-main event of UFC 161. That drama is stealing some of the thunder from the fight card that is taking place this weekend, UFC on Fuel 10.  True, the June 8 card doesn’t have the name recognition that the June 15 event does, but it does have a very important main event between heavyweight competitors Fabricio Werdum and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira.

Werdum enters the fight as the No. 3-ranked fighter in the UFC’s heavyweight division, while Nogueira is ranked eighth in the division.  Despite Werdum’s high ranking in the division, when there is talk about who is on the short list to face the winner of the yet-to-be-booked bout between champion Cain Velasquez and former champion Junior dos Santos, Werdum’s name is rarely, if ever mentioned.

A win over Nogueira, a former Pride and UFC interim champion, may result in Werdum gaining some traction in the title shot conversation.  For Nogueira, a win over Werdum, a fighter he has defeated in the past, means he will remain, at 37 years of age, a top-10 fighter in the heavyweight division.

The first meeting between the two took place in Pride. Nogueira had his hand raised after a three-round battle in the quarterfinal round of the 2006 Pride openweight tournament.

Rick J. Lee recently spoke to Werdum’s coach at King’s MMA, Rafael Cordeiro. Cordeiro, who was voted 2012 MMA Coach of the Year at the Fighter’s Only awards, broke down Werdum’s upcoming fight with Nogueira and also discussed when he thinks Werdum will be ready to fight for UFC gold.

UFC on Fuel 10 will take place on June 8 in Fortaleza, Brazil.

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UFC 161: Shogun Rua on Antonio Rogerio Nogueira’s Injury Removal

On Sunday, Globo.com (h/t MMAJunkie.com) reported that Antonio Rogerio Nogueira was forced to withdraw from his summer showdown with Mauricio “Shogun” Rua.Any time a high-profile competitor suffers an injury, speculation over their replacement ensues.I…

On Sunday, Globo.com (h/t MMAJunkie.com) reported that Antonio Rogerio Nogueira was forced to withdraw from his summer showdown with Mauricio “Shogun” Rua.

Any time a high-profile competitor suffers an injury, speculation over their replacement ensues.

If Chael Sonnen gets his way, he would be Nogueira’s replacement—and Shogun’s new opponent. Sonnen tweeted shortly after the news broke of Nogueira’s injury that he would volunteer his services to as a fill-in at UFC 161. 

Whether Sonnen‘s efforts will prevail is yet to be learned, but discussions are underway and Rua vs. Sonnen is at the very least a possibility at this point.

On Monday, Fighters Only spoke with Shogun about the shakeup, questioning him on Nogueira’s injury.

“I think everybody wanted to watch this bout again, since we had a great duel at Pride [Critical Countdown 2005],” he explained. “I am sorry for Minotouro not to fight, it would be a very good fight, I am sure.”

The first time the two squared off, a young Rua used a mixture of effective strikes and takedowns to earn himself a unanimous decision win.

However, Nogueira proved to be one of the stiffest tests Shogun had faced to that point in his career and the experience of the bout left him with nothing but respect for his fellow countryman.

“I respect Lil Nog so much, I have absolutely nothing against him,” he said. “He’s a very nice guy. We’re opponents inside the Octagon, just it. I wish him a good recovery for him to return soon to do his good job.”

It will be interesting to hear the tune that the always-classy Rua sings should Sonnen end up as his UFC 161 foe. The American is notorious for getting under his opponent’s skin, something he has been particularly diligent about when matched up with Brazilian fighters.

Shogun neglected to comment about a potential scrap with Sonnen, but if the pairing is booked, you can bet noise will follow.

Not necessarily from Rua, but there will certainly be noise.

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